Recent events have seen a rival of our national discussion on police, racial minorities, and the seemingly unending instances of violence being inflicted by the former on the latter. In light of this, we here at Culture War Reporters thought it might be helpful for everyone to break down this complex (or perhaps not so complex) issue with colorful boxes and simple choices.
Well folks, it happened. In a move that continues to shock the world, Britain has dramatically voted to leave the European Union.
And make no mistake readers- the Brexit is the worst thing that has ever happened. Or the best thing. Or…
Well, something.
For all the outrage, jubilation, and wild speculation, the reality of the situation is that most folks have been caught off guard by this decision- and probably none moreso than folks on this side of the Atlantic.
Plenty of conservatives- including potential American president Donald Trump- have applauded the Brexit, claiming it to be a victory for small government, autonomy, and “making Britain great again.”
Which is something that should probably concern the rest of the world…
On the other hand, liberals have been howling that the Brexit represents a secession not simply from Europe but from progressive values, freedom of movement, and a commitment to peace and unity in general.
With all that noise, dear readers, it can be tough to hear the truth.
And unfortunately, we don’t have it either. The reality is that this is an absurdly complicated issue with far-reaching implications and plenty of ramifications that we can only guess at. So rather than add to the din, we here at Culture War Reporters have gathered the most pertinent issues for your own consideration. Continue reading
Posted in bizarreness, Europe, geography, government, Islam, news, politics, race, Travel, Youth
Tagged Brexit, Britain, Catalonia, democracy, EDL, elitist, England, english, EU, European Union, Geert Wilders, ireland, Islamophobia, Jingoist, Marine Le Pen, Nationalism, nationalist, Negatives, northern ireland, Positives, racist, Referendum, Schegen, scotland, Seccession, Sicily, Trump, UK, wales, Xenophobic
Last Friday I asked you all to watch a short video on the concept of intertextuality, which provides the basis for this week’s post.
While Nerdwriter1, the YouTuber responsible, initially describes the device as “something in a text, in this case a movie, that is shaped by another text” he later goes a step further in making the term distinct from mere allusion. Contemporary intertextuality, which he refers to as being “weaponized”, is defined as:
“objects, people or situations explicitly meant to trigger an emotional response”
To use my own visual example, successful intertextuality results in a combination of:
and
Being able to recognize and understand the reference is important, but equally essential is having that recognization elicit feelings, whether they be of awe, or joy, or pleasant surprise. Simply identifying a shot in a film as the replication of a comic book panel matters most if you care[d] about that original work. Continue reading
Posted in film, gender, race, Uncategorized, writing
Tagged allusion, different, female, film, fresh, Ghostbusters, intertextuality, Nerdwriter1, new, Ocean's Eleven, old, race, reboot, reference, remake, repetition, same, sequel, silver lining, Star Wars, The Force Awakens, The Magnificent Seven, weaponized intertextuality
By now you’ve probably heard that Stanford student Brock Allen Turner was sentenced to only 6 months in prison for raping an unconscious woman at a party. You’ve probably also heard his father shamelessly attempt to downplay Turner’s actions as “20 minutes of action”.
Hopefully, you’ve also read the letter written by the rape survivor. In it, she breaks down many of the myths around rape, myths Turner’s defence used to attack her testimony and represent Turner as some kind of victim instead. Her heartbreaking personal account has broken down the defences of almost everyone who has read it (except Turner and his father, it would seem). According to Buzzfeed, one of the main sites to release her letter, her words have “gone viral” in a way few conversations about sexual assault ever do.
And as the word has spread, almost everyone has gotten behind this brave woman. Her story has brought light to the problem of systemic injustices, like light penalties for many cases of sexual assault and disproportionate penalties based on racial or economic background.
More than anything her story has prompted a united public outrage. Every comment I have read expresses distain and anger towards Turner and sympathy for his victim. Even internet trolls who would normally find a reason to challenge the victim’s story (i.e. some members of the Men’s Rights Reddit page) admit that “outrage over this issue is legitimate” (although their comments inevitably lead back to criticizing feminism).
In some ways it’s encouraging to witness the attack on Brock Turner. It seems like we’re experiencing a massive shift in the way we talk about rape and sexual violence. As this story has unfolded we’ve seen few if any attempts to slut shame or victim blame in the media or public conversation.
As glad as I am that this conversation has come out in favour of the victim, I can’t help but wonder if the public condemnation of Turner actually signals for a yearning for justice, or if perhaps other factors are at play. I’ve been struggling with two questions in particular. Continue reading
Posted in crime, media, morality, news, politics, race, sex
Tagged 20 minutes of action, abusive, Anonymous, athlete, attitude, backlash, blood, Brave, Brock Turner, conversation shift, crowd, cultural shift, economic, father, hospital, hypocrisy, inequality, Judge Persky, justice, letter, media, Men, men's rights, mob, penalties, physical assault, prison, questions, racial, rape, representation, revenge, Sexual Assault, slut shame, stanford, Stanford rape, stanford rapist, survivor, systemic injustice, testimony, trauma, victim, victim blame, witnesses, woman, women
An obvious part of my excitement for tonight’s season finale was the fact that it affords me a break from reviewing this show weekly, which is much appreciated given how busy my life has been lately. As far as the actual content of the episode there was finally finding out if Max and Randy have a future, with getting to see more Asian characters appear on the show [which I only realized when putting together the header image above] trailing far behind.
Let’s just say that I’m glad I wasn’t particularly excited about the latter. To get that out of the way before really digging into the plot points 2 Broke Girls continues to be so bad at dealing with racial minorities, particularly when it comes to Asians. This is particularly surprising when taking into account how many have been featured lately, at least in comparison to other groups. In this season alone we had a flamboyantly gay hotel manager in LA [Alec Mapa] and an anal-obsessed realtor [Camille Chen], both of whom had a decent amount of lines and screentime as side characters go.
While it is very fair to say that the majority of bit parts on 2 Broke Girls don’t allow for much more than a few quick, cheap laughs, regardless of race, the problem becomes noticeable when focusing on the main cast. Han Lee is the only Asian character among them, and can be summed up in a single word: pathetic. He exists to be the butt of every joke, and when every other Asian face can be boiled down to “dramatic” and “really likes anal sex” the optics don’t look too great.
Joining those two is Hwang Hwang, a Korean gangster played by Jimmie Saito. He’s meant to be a threat to Han’s well-being but never actually feels dangerous, and after watching his demo reel sounds like the director told him to play it up, and then just kept repeating that over and over and over again. Anyway. This show not doing well with race. Not exactly news. Continue reading
Posted in Comedy, race, relationships, review, television, writing
Tagged 2 Broke Girls, acting, And the Big Gamble, asian, Beth Behrs, boyfriend, breakup, Caroline, CBS, debt, Dessert Bar, Ed Quinn, emotions, gamble, Hwang Hwang, Jimmie Saito, karaoke, Kat Dennings, Last Dance, Max, Oleg, race, Randy, review, S5E22, vulnerability
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Culture War Reporters 
“You Might as Well Have [insert character here] Be [insert 2-4 minority types here]!”
One of the most common adages on the internet is “don’t read the comments”. While this global network that we’re all currently using [unless you somehow managed to snag a printout of this post] has given us all the ability to share and discuss everything under the sun, the unfortunate truth is that a lot of that conversation amounts to hot garbage. You could scroll down past an article to see what people are saying about it, but chances are that it won’t be a particularly uplifting experience.
As someone who spends much of his time online reading about entertainment there’s a type of comment that I’ve seen crop up time and time again. It’s existence ties directly into a lot of the recent trends in comic books, television, and film, the push towards inclusivity and the people who are actively working to make that happen. A perfect example [of a handful I’ll be referencing throughout this article] is:
“disabled, multiracial trans women with disfiguring facial scars” – posted on “There are more (white) women starring in movies than ever before”
I’ve been compiling these for the past few months, originally with the intent of putting together another “For Your Consideration” and allowing readers to look them over and come to their own conclusions. A general [and accurate] takeaway would be to note them as being typical of inane online comments and move on, but I’d like to spend a little time breaking down the idiocy they represent.
They Perpetuate the Default
The default person, in case you needed to be informed of who generally holds the most power and screentime across the board, is a straight able-bodied cisgendered White man. I’m painfully aware that simply listing those words in successive order like that marks me as being one of the SJWs [my thoughts on that term here], but every one is important to take note of.
Take the following:
“black Asian gay lesbian transgender Spider-man” – posted on “Dear HOLLYWOOD REPORTER: May We Have a Word About ‘Cultural Appropriation’?”
To look at the list and mark it against the checklist of what makes a default human being, in the eyes of at least a few, we have:
Other comments I’ll be including later on will add examples that include disabled people, but the general gist of every one capitalizes on the absurdity of a person who doesn’t match the standard cutout. A straight able-bodied cisgendered White woman? Not a terrible strain of the imagination. Once you start to tick off more items that don’t coincide with the norm, however, things apparently get a lot shakier.
I don’t even think that many of these commenters are aware of the implicit message behind the words they type. By listing these adjectives and identifiers they end up with a person who most of them share absolutely nothing in common with, which exposes the very reason we need diversity at all. Everyone should be able to relate to entertainment, and for too long the industry has catered to an audience that gets smaller every day. Continue reading →
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Posted in comics, film, gender, internet, lgbt, race, television
Tagged believable, black, character, comment, comments section, complaints, default, disabled, diversity, gay, internet comments, lesbian, lgbt, marginalized, minority, possibility, race, realistic, representation, straight, Transgender, transgendered, visibility, white, why not have