Topic: The Last Airbender... Racist? (Read 6523 times)

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Japan is not exactly an ethically diverse nation.

America is.

Ye I'm sure they don't have many men.
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i dunno about you guys but let me blunt for a second here and say that I have a hard time telling asians and people from the middle east apart, and it's usually 15 minutes minimum into a movie before i can differentiate characters. I think hair has a lot to do with it though, and there doesn't seem to be a lot of choice for asians...
Maybe this is a racist issue for ya know, real movies, but since this is a nickelodeon movie i don't think there is a huge problem using masses of a single ethnicity to represent exactly that. extras are just extras right, nothing about them matters in the least save for what they look like?
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Maybe this is a racist issue for ya know, real movies, but since this is a nickelodeon movie i don't think there is a huge problem using masses of a single ethnicity to represent exactly that. extras are just extras right, nothing about them matters in the least save for what they look like?
Exactly.

The whities are having all this action while the minority extras are walking around the background. The Asian people in this movie are primarily, just the extras.
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you ever think that they chose the actors they did because they maybe had an established career and maybe nick didn't feel like rummaging through hundreds of actors to find asian lead roles? Extras are extras and extras are fucking backscene shit they don't really matter.

Yeah its stupid as hell for them to do but I really love how you jump on this dumb shit when (to me) its very clearly just Hollywood not giving a fuck about some dumb anime movie and trying to half ass the film by not finding some asian guy to play in a stupid cartoon movie.

Psyburn I really have a serious question do you think asian people are discriminated against in the US? Does little shit like this really eat away at you or is this part of your internet persona because really its a fucking cartoon and its fucking asians who in the hell would even bother discriminating against asians anymore I thought that shit was over.

I really think you make yourself oversensitive to this retarded bullshit like everyone is out to get the asians when really who the fuck would even bother.
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naw asians do have a lot of negative stereotypes are often portrayed in pretty unflattering ways in the media

i think it's a sales thing. asians are "TOO FOREIGN" for a lot of non-asian people to identify with comfortably so there's kinda a push to keep them in the periphery.

I get where these people are coming from, but it's over a gay live action adaptation of a anime so whoooooo fuckkin cares
Last Edit: June 27, 2009, 10:48:59 am by DietCoke
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Japan is not exactly an ethically diverse nation.

America is.

Quote
Ye I'm sure they don't have many men.

this is what i meant, if a woman can be jfk then whites can play asian roles

remember hittchhiker's guide guys?  i fussed about mos def too until i saw him and then i liked it (well i liked HIM the movie wasn't very good)

also

Quote
I get where these people are coming from, but it's over a gay live action adaptation of a anime so whoooooo fuckkin cares
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don't ever doubt mos def
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I don't understand how it isn't racist how they cast all these white people as leads, and then do a shitload of casting calls all over the States for "authentic Asian" people to walk around the background with this white kid throws fireballs and shit. Then they casted Dev Patel to kinda balance shit out but damn idk. That's like saying Kung Fu isn't racist and it's stupid to make a big deal out of casting David Carradine instead of Bruce Lee, even though it very much is clearly  racist. Or how about "The Good Earth" movie where they stuck a bunch of white man and taped their eyes and shit.
You know, the only reason why I came into this topic was because I figured you might have posted.

It kind of surprises me. In some way this is an extremely typical Psyburn post but I thought you'd side with the film industry's "right to be racist" (because there IS a race bias in film; that's the way it's always been, not just in Hollywood, and nobody seems to be interested in ideology in this regard).

i think it's a sales thing. asians are "TOO FOREIGN" for a lot of non-asian people to identify with comfortably so there's kinda a push to keep them in the periphery.
Yeah this is it basically.

By the way, if this is about an anime, isn't everybody in the original show white anyhow?
EDIT: oh wait, they're not. Why does the lead character have blue arrows on his head and arms?
Last Edit: June 27, 2009, 03:09:42 pm by Dada
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No Dada, don't ask psyburn about the film industry.  He's just going to tell you about how "the system" won't let anyone make a film with a leading asian, even though there are so many films made outside of hollywood.  Any post related to this argument needs to have the response "put up or shut up" btw.
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The character were voiced by white people. Maybe that's why. (And Mark Hamill should play Ozai in the movie)
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I think its completely up to the director to decide if he wants a white lead or not, its his movie after all and if he decides to put a few robots in there and maybe some hookers too that’s his prerogative.. at the end of the day its up to the individual to decide if they want to go see the movie or not.
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No Dada, don't ask psyburn about the film industry.
In retrospect, I don't know what I was thinking.
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I always thought Ford was black. What disappointed me the most was how they made Arthur white, rather than an aardvark as he was originally intended.
You know, the only reason why I came into this topic was because I figured you might have posted.

It kind of surprises me. In some way this is an extremely typical Psyburn post but I thought you'd side with the film industry's "right to be racist" (because there IS a race bias in film; that's the way it's always been, not just in Hollywood, and nobody seems to be interested in ideology in this regard).
So that makes it ok? For a man so learnèd on fallacies you sure do love to use them.
By the way, if this is about an anime, isn't everybody in the original show white anyhow?
EDIT: oh wait, they're not. Why does the lead character have blue arrows on his head and arms?
Because he's the Avatar. The arrows symbolize the four corners of the world and their unity in peace, or alternatively the four elements of Bending and their unity in the Avatar.
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Quote
The arrows symbolize the four corners of the world and their unity in peace, or alternatively the four elements of Bending and their unity in the Avatar.

i felt gay for just reading this sentence sorry
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I think its completely up to the director to decide if he wants a white lead or not, its his movie after all and if he decides to put a few robots in there and maybe some hookers too that’s his prerogative.. at the end of the day its up to the individual to decide if they want to go see the movie or not.
Not in the Hollywood studio. The producers ultimately control everything. I mean, how many times have you heard stories about directors fighting producers over certain creative decisions? It's not like how it works in Asia, where everything is completely up to the director anyway.
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there are movies outside of hollywood (put up or shut up)
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How can they make an Avatar movie when Mako is dead? Nobody else could ever play Uncle Iroh, and Avatar sucks without Uncle Iroh.
Fuck this shit, movie's dumb.

also the only non white people in the show are like Inuits and a lot of the extras are Asian I guess. Avatar guy, antagonist dude(and his family), and blind chick are white, the other two main characters are Inuit.
And they're all voiced by white people. I see no problem with the casting?
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Avatar guy, antagonist dude(and his family), and blind chick are white
No, they're Asian. The Avatar's race is debatable, but the Fire nation is Japanese and the Earth nation is Chinese.
Last Edit: June 27, 2009, 08:43:42 pm by earl
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I guess it is kind of racist to make the guy white but I think it's worth it for realism's sake. There's no WAY an asian could bend wind like that
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They cast Shia TheBeef as Sam Witwicky in Transformers. I'm pretty certain that the career of Casting in Hollywood is run by penguins.