Cartoon media item (Bugs Bunny)

http://www.ferris.edu/jimcrow/cartoons/41.jpg

I did my media item on a still framed image of Bugs Bunny and a barber shop quartette. Bugs Bunny is wearing a green bow tie and playing the banjo and what looks like a fast pace to the rhythm of the quartette. The Quartette is wearing white pants, green bow tie, black and gray shoes, and matching red jackets. But the outfits everyone is wearing, isn’t the only thing that they have in common. All of them, even the lovable Bugs Bunny, have their heads either panted brown or this is was just a skit off of the main show. But never the less, all members in the picture are drawn to portray an African American. They are also standing on what could easily be portrayed as a plantation of some degree.
This cartoon is closely related to what we learned from the video called Ethnic Notions. Throughout history, people have not just the African race but many others that they are very different. This cartoon depicts how the African Americans were back in the days of slavery and on plantations. It teaches the youth of America a false way to think about things that happened. Slaves didn’t enjoy being slaves and didn’t sing for the sole joy of it, they sung because they were going through tough times and needed a way to express themselves without breaking a law over it. This still image can say a thousand words about all the bad imagery the United States has made to portray black people, and it was found in a children’s cartoon. The cartoon has created racial hysteria which means, the many racial ideas that are shown in movies, advertisements, and cartoons. The movie Ethnic Notions also tells us that the newer generations will judge just the same or even harsher towards the minority because of the media they have grown up with.
I personally can’t believe that this cartoon was ever aired. I must have been a much different time back in the 80’s when this cartoon was made. Because I know now, that if this cartoon was aired and created in today’s standards, well it wouldn’t be even aired for being so racist. Networks and many newspapers get sued for having racism. I just can’t get the thought out of my head that I have probably seen this cartoon before. And unfortunately, I probably laughed along with it, and in doing so, feeding the fire that made it right to create it in the first place. I just hope this cartoon doesn’t play anymore on television. It would just show that America hasn’t done much to help clear up or fix any racist things they’ve done in the past.

Aunt Jemima

Aunt Jemima Salt and Pepper Shakers

http://giftsofharvest.com/images/a_J_salt_pepper_tall_66_7432.jpg

Ethnic Notions. Marlon Riggs

The media item I found were a pair of salt and pepper shakers portrayed after Aunt Jemima. There are two identical shakers, one for salt and the other for pepper, sitting beside each other. They’re wearing white handkerchiefs, white aprons with red poke-a-dots, red dress’s, and a red head scarf. But what makes them so different is the shade of black their faces, hands, and feet are. They are a glossy pitch black.
The Aunt Jemima shakers are just one of many was the United States used to portray the blacks. According to the film Ethnic Notions, black people were theatrically portray to be a much different kind of people. The United States used caricatures of black people in cartoons, television, radio, advertisement, and in our case of the shakers, everyday home necessities. When having all these different views of black people in everyday things; people then just starting thinking that’s how African Americans really are. They never stopped to realize that black people had feeling too, and how they felt when they saw these caricatures of their own people. Seeing these images all over, everyone started stereotyping black people after famous black people like Jim Crow, Sambo, and the common black nanny figure we see for example as Aunt Jemima. With new generations seeing these stereotypes, they then made their own judgments and the lies kept on building. It even got to be so bad that black people in movie would darken themselves more just to fit the stereotypes.
I think that these salt and pepper shakers should be destroyed in one thought but yet kept in a museum in another. They should be destroyed because they show an awful stereotype of how the United States and people used to look at the African Americans. We portrayed them as an inferior race and made them look dreadful in countless cases. On the other hand, if we destroy these precious remains, we could never admit to our wrongs. By destroying them and all the rest of that materials we portrayed blacks as, it would be so easy to say it never happened then. And I would never want that to happen again and want us to learn from our mistakes in history. Because we must learn and understand our mistakes to make sure they never happen again.

Ethnic Newswatch Media Item

Why Capitalism Isn't A Dirty Word
Session, Michael. The Skanner. Portland, Or.: Jul 17, 1996. Vol. XXI, Iss. 39; pg. 4

http://0-proquest.umi.com.maurice.bgsu.edu:80/pqdweb?did=495924131&sid=7&Fmt=3&clientId=3340&RQT=309&VName=PQD

Johnson, G. Allan. Power, Privilege, and Difference Second Edition. Mcrgaw-Hill. New York, 2006. 108-124.

I’m doing my media article on Capitalism. I found it through the BGSU libraries database called Ethnic Newswatch. The name of the article is “Why Capitalism Isn’t A Dirty Word.” The reason I chose this article is because we read a whole chapter out of Johnson’s book named Power, Privilege, and Difference. It was the third chapter that dealt specifically on how capitalism started up racism. And this article goes into the details of backing up that capitalism didn’t start it, but yet it was “self-interest” that started racism. There is also a chapter in Johnson book about different steps in dealing with racism, chapter eight, and I believe this article can touch with some of those points.
Abstract (Summary)
Unfortunately, to many Black Americans, capitalism is a dirty word. The word capitalism brings to mind images of racial subjugation and degradation. According to this world view, capitalism is seen in its most hideous form when viewed within the context of the Black American experience. After all, was it not capitalist America that held Black people in bondage for over 400 years?
A key economic precept of capitalism is consumer sovereignty. This is to say consumers are empowered to make their own choices independent of the choices of others. This notion of consumer as king results in a diffusion of power, thereby avoiding a dangerous concentration of power. This capitalism serves to separate economy and state much as our constitution separates church and state. The benefit of capitalism is that not all things are decided by the zero-sum game of politics. SELF-INTEREST IS KEY.
In Mobile, Ala., the streetcar company initially refused to comply until its streetcar conductors began to be arrested and fined for noncompliance with the law. In Jacksonville, Fla., the streetcar company delayed enforcing the segregated seating law of 1901 until 1905. Georgia's state law of 1891 segregating the races was ignored by the streetcar company in August until 1898, and in Savannah until 1899. In Tennessee, the streetcar company opposed the state legislation imposing Jim Crow seating in 1903, delayed enforcement after the law was passed, and eventually was able to get the state court to declare it unconstitutional.
In this article, the author points out that even though there were laws that enforced segregation, the capitalist tried not to enforce them. By not enforcing them, they would loose business (Session). I can understand that but what about the years of oppression and troubles African Americans have gone through. Because of capitalism, people have committed genocide, had numerous conquests, and ignored signed treaties (Johnson, 46). And this brings me to chapter eight of Johnson’s book, because I see this author using two of Johnson’s ways of getting off the hook. He is using “deny and minimize” and “blame the victim” in this article (Johnson, 108-111). Deny and minimize is used when the author talks about how most of the capitalist presence was in the north during America’s early days. And that the north was made up of Free states; the same free states that defeated the south, which ended slavery (Session). Johnson says this is the easiest way to get off the hook, and “closely related to denial is the minimization of the trouble by acknowledging that it exist but then claiming that it doesn’t amount to much,” and I feel that this is what Michael Session has done in his article (Johnson, 109). He is also blaming the victim in one section towards the end of the article when saying, “In fact, if Black American political leaders gave greater emphasis to economic freedom it would become clear to people that their economic freedom is being held back by the liberal welfare state agenda sponsored by the very political class that is supposed to serve their interest” (Session). He is blaming the black race for why they are not had successful political leaders, by pointing out their low welfare states. Overall this is a pretty racist article that has some good supporting points but in the end, the author doesn’t have enough support for Capitalism not to be a bad word, for the blacks.

True Romance

The movie True Romance came out in September of 1993. It stared big names such as Christain Slater, Patricia Arquette, Val Kilmer, Dennis Hopper, Brad Pitt, Samuel L. Jackson, and Christopher Walken. It was directed by Tony Scott and written by Quentin Tarantino. The media item I chose to talk about was the 1993 film True Romance. This is one of my favorite movies. It is Quentin Tarantino’s views of what he thinks true romance would be in real life. The romance and love that is so true that people would kill for. A summary and quick view of the movie was found at IMDB or internet movie database, “Clarence Worley, a penniless hipster in Detroit with a love for Elvis meets a mysterious hooker paid to meet him named Alabama on his birthday in a theater at night. Falling in love, he makes it his mission to dispose of her past, namely her violent pimp, Drexl Spivey. Defeating him and unknowingly taking a vast fortune of Cocaine, the two fight to sell the white gold in Los Angeles as Drexl's associates fight to reclaim it in a bloody romantic thriller full to the brim with style.” But it was a confrontation between Dennis Hopper’s character Cliff, and Christopher Walken’s Character known as Coccotti that stands out to me about ethnicity. The scene starts from when Cliff comes home and finds that Coccotti is in his trailer and looking for his son, the person that has the stolen cocaine. After getting beaten for a bit and his palm slit, Cliff and Coccotti have a one on one conversation. The script found at Script-o-rama.com quotes the scene:

COCCOTTI

Sicilians are great liars. The best in the world. I'm a Sicilian. And my old man was the world heavyweight champion of Sicilian liars. And from growin' up with him I learned the pantomime. Now there are seventeen different things a guy can do when he lies to give him away. A guy has seventeen pantomimes. A woman's got twenty, but a guy's got seventeen. And if you know 'em like ya know your own face, they beat lie detectors to hell. What we got here is a little game of show and tell. You don't wanna show me nothin'. But you're tellin' me everything. Now I know you know where they are. So tell me, before I do some damage you won't walk away from.

The awful pain in Cliff's hand is being replaced by the awful pain in his heart. He looks deep into Coccotti's eyes.

CLIFF

Could I have one of those Chesterfields now?

COCCOTTI

Sure.

Coccotti leans over and hands him a smoke.

CLIFF

Got a match?

Cliff reaches into his pocket and pulls out a lighter.

CLIFF

Oh, don't bother. I got one. (he lights the cigarette) So you're a Sicilian, huh?

COCCOTTI

(intensly) Uh-huh.

CLIFF

You know I read a lot. Especially things that have to do with history. I find that shit fascinating. In fact, I don't know if you know this or not, Sicilians were spawned by niggers. All the men stop what they were doing and look at Cliff, except for Tooth-pic Vic who doesn't speak English and so isn't insulted. Coccotti can't believe what he's hearing.

COCCOTTI

Come again?

CLIFF

It's a fact. Sicilians have nigger blood pumpin' through their hearts. If you don't believe me, look it up. You see, hundreds and hundreds of years ago the Moors conquered Sicily. And Moors are niggers. Way back then, Sicilians were like the wops in northern Italy. Blond hair, blue eyes. But, once the Moors moved in there, they changed the whole country. They did so much fuckin' with the Sicilian women, they changed the blood-line for ever, from blond hair and blue eyes to black hair and dark skin. I find it absolutely amazing to think that to this day, hundreds of years later, Sicilians still carry that nigger gene. I'm just quotin' history. It's a fact. It's written. Your ancestors were niggers. Your great, great, great, great, great-grandmother was fucked by a nigger, and had a half-nigger kid. that is a fact. Now tell me, am I lyin'?

Coccotti looks at him for a moment then jumps up, whips out an automatic, grabs hold of Cliff's hair, puts the barrel to his temple, and pumps three bullets through Cliff's head.He pushes the body violently aside. Coccotti pauses. Unable to express his feelings and frustrated by the blood in his hands, he simply drops his weapon, and turns to his men.

COCCOTTI

I haven't killed anybody since 1974. Goddamn his soul to burn for eternity in fuckin' hell for makin' me spill blood on my hands! Go to this comedian's son's apartment and come back with somethin' that tells me where that asshole went so I can wipe this egg off of my face and fix this fucked-up family for good.
This can be related to many of articles and videos that we talked about in class. First, Screen Race: the Power of Illusion Part one disproves this whole conversation because “race is not biologically real.” Cliff talks about how there genes were altered by the Moors and this couldn’t be possible because genetically people aren’t that different. And it is a proven fact that race can’t be proven through DNA. So Cliff’s theory about Coccotti might be true about history, but isn’t true about genes. This scene can also be related to Zinn’s chapter two named Drawling the Color Line. It portrays the views that black people are inferior to the white race. The fact that Coccotti got so mad and killed another man over this insult, can be taken as an insult to the African race too. In today's society Concotti thinks it is so bad to be related to a black person, that he must kill the person that accused him of it. He thinks that he has a greater privilege than black people and this whole scene shows oppression towards African American race. This man is so mad that his family tree could possibly be traced back to an African, that he kills a weaponless man in cold blood. This just supports Zinn’s views that racism just didn’t start one day out of thin air, and with this movie having this racist scene portraying it bad, to be a “nigger” only worsen things. This was a box office hit and a wide range of people watched it, and not to tell you that people believe everything they here in movies, but they sure take into account for what they hear. This scene could only have made racism worse in the United States and give support to Zinn and Screen Race: the Power of Illusion Part one.

Movie information can be found at
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0108399/
The entire script can be found at
http://www.script-o-rama.com/snazzy/dircut.html