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Unread 06-11-2020, 06:19 AM
Mark McDonnell Mark McDonnell is offline
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Default Cultural Sensitivity

I was going to post this on the George Floyd Protest thread as it is obviously connected, but I didn't want to take the focus off the more pressing political and social concerns of that thread. I know this might seem trivial in the grand scheme, and if people want to ignore this post I'll take it as confirmation of that. But I don't think being concerned about racism and being concerned about this need be mutually exclusive.

Netflix has apparently removed from its streaming site a number of TV shows that have suddenly been deemed 'inappropriate'. I don't watch much TV these days, but I noticed that 3 of these shows are British comedies (actually 2 British and 1 Australian) that I loved when they were first out and still do. All seem to have been removed over concerns about the use of 'blackface'.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.the...over-blackface

The League of Gentleman is a surreal comedy set in a fictional small northern English Town. Its characters are often over the top parodies of small town insularity. Its tone is heightened grotesquery and informed by the weirdest aspects of British culture and 60s and 70s English horror movies. One of the characters is a figure called Papa Lazarou, a travelling circus performer in blackface. He only appeared a couple of times in the whole series. He is a terrifying fairy tale 'child catcher' like figure whose mission seems to be to kidnap local women to increase his collection of wives. If anything, the character is a Romany gypsy stereotype. Though I would argue that it is so removed from the real world that accusations of racism are undeserved even here. It is an incredible TV show.

The Mighty Boosh is a very surreal sitcom about 2 would-be musicians, one a jazz fan and one a rock fan, who work in a small zoo. It often parodies pop culture and pop music obsessives, though with an obvious affection and brilliant musical pastiches. One episode had one of the main characters, jazz enthusiast Howard Moon, visited by the 'Spirit of Jazz', an obvious nod to the Robert Johnson 'crossroads' myth. The Spirit of Jazz (played by the other main performer) is in New Orleans style voodoo makeup. I didn't even think of him as necessarily black when I watched it, more a Dr John type figure. But even if he is I suppose my question is, does it matter? Again, this character only appeared once but the whole series has been removed.

Summer Heights High is a mockumentary set in an ordinary Australian High School. Being a teacher of this age group for over 20 years, I loved it. It captured school life better and more realistically than any drama I'd seen. The show's writer/main performer plays 3 characters: delusional Drama teacher Mr G, horrible snobbish private school exchange student Ja'mie, and troubled, educationally disadvantaged bully Jonah. Jonah is from the island of Tonga and the actor is in brownface. He is by far the most sympathetic of the three characters, despite his aggressive tendencies, and the scenes featuring him are some of the most realistic portrayals of what it's like to deal with challenging behavior in a classroom that I've seen. There is nothing racist about the presentation of the character. He uses violence and homophobic language, but he is a troubled 13 year old and it seems an entirely realistic portrayal.

Now I know the shows haven't been 'banned', they are shown elsewhere and you can still buy them on DVD presumably, but I question what possible link these shows have to institutional racism in the US police force and how removing them, and therefore rendering them taboo by tarring them with the 'racist' brush, helps the project. It certainly won't help the shows' writers and performers. They seem to me (particularly the first two) to be in the tradition of grotesque and carnivalesque art, where cross dressing, subversion of accepted norms and general bizarreness are the life-blood. We've been down this road before with the controversy about the poem in the Nation magazine. I always get twitchy when art seems to fall foul of cultural sensitivity and I think removing these shows is a terrible idea that sends a terrible message about artistic freedom. Here are the offending scenes/characters from each. I would defend each one vociferously. I wondered what others thought about the decision. It's possible that the images play very differently in the US to the UK. It could be as simple as that.

https://youtu.be/s2F4ZWTjwTU

https://youtu.be/pNuUNHlsPgI

https://youtu.be/sygNIPyUWds

Last edited by Mark McDonnell; 06-11-2020 at 10:40 AM.
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Unread 06-11-2020, 08:35 AM
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R. Nemo Hill R. Nemo Hill is offline
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"I always get twitchy when art seems to fall foul of cultural sensitivity and I think removing these shows is a terrible idea that sends a terrible message about artistic freedom." What disturbs me is the authoritarianism of it: that not enough credit is given to individual to come to their own conclusions, either pro or con, and then express them in what will always be an imperfect world. Granted certain folks far more in the line of fire have more skin in the game, and so will of course be far more sensitive. And as a symbolic trend it may serve its purpose to impart that sensitivity more vividly to a wider range of the population. But it is a slippery slope, and I am glad I do not have to serve as referee for it.

Nemo
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Unread 06-11-2020, 11:34 AM
Aaron Novick Aaron Novick is offline
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From reading the article, it sounds like Netflix made this decision of their own accord, and not because particular groups were calling for it (did I miss something?). It's a pure business decision, and, as such, this seems the right appraisal (though saying that comedy history is getting "smashed" is absurdly hyperbolic; it's getting pulled from Netflix, dude):
The comedian Jack Carroll tweeted that the decision to remove the comedy was a way for Netflix to avoid any “real work” to counteract racism. “It’s an arbitrary gesture that means they don’t have to put any real work into combatting actual instances of racial discrimination and comedy history is getting smashed in the process. Glad I kept hold of my DVD’s,”
I don't know about the history of blackface in England, but in the US it's sordid, and there's good reason to be upset about it. Whether calling for streaming platforms to stop hosting films that include it is the best response to that upset is another matter. It may surprise you, Mark, but I tend to come down on the side that it's not.
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Unread 06-11-2020, 11:50 AM
Mark McDonnell Mark McDonnell is offline
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No, there's nothing in the Guardian article that suggests any particular groups were calling for this action to be taken. You'd think, though, that if a multi-billion dollar enterprise like Netflix just wanted to do something to avoid any 'real work' they could have just thrown a couple of million at an anti-racism organisation, rather than taking this move which is bound to be divisive.

Last edited by Mark McDonnell; 06-11-2020 at 12:01 PM.
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Unread 06-11-2020, 12:32 PM
Aaron Novick Aaron Novick is offline
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I hear a lot that such decisions are "divisive", but, given that companies keep making them, I can only infer that they are not so divisive as to harm the bottom line, which seems like the relevant definition in this context.
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Unread 06-11-2020, 12:49 PM
James Brancheau James Brancheau is offline
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I took a summer course on Faulkner in graduate school, and a fourth of the class dropped it. Which left 9 of us, ha. But it was made clear why. I disagreed, finished the class. Context is everything. Gone with the Wind is gone from somewhere too. Which I agree with. Window or mirror, or both, can be a beautiful thing. But when it's just meeting a racist expectation of the times- and let's face it, just lazy and callously stupid too, it's time to knock the knees out of it. Evil truly is banal.
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Unread 06-11-2020, 02:14 PM
Mark McDonnell Mark McDonnell is offline
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Quote:
I hear a lot that such decisions are "divisive", but, given that companies keep making them, I can only infer that they are not so divisive as to harm the bottom line, which seems like the relevant definition in this context
Well, I'll retract divisive in favour of 'stupid and cowardly' in these cases.
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Unread 06-11-2020, 02:34 PM
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Ann Drysdale Ann Drysdale is offline
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Sorry. Thought better of it.

Last edited by Ann Drysdale; 06-11-2020 at 02:46 PM.
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Unread 06-11-2020, 02:35 PM
Aaron Novick Aaron Novick is offline
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I guess I can't even motivate myself to that judgment, because my mental model of Netflix brass' decision making is purely economic. It's either instrumentally rational or it's not. (If it's not, then it might be "stupid", but not in the way you mean.) Moral evaluations like "cowardly" seem out of place—they ascribe way too much genuineness to the decision.

This is somewhat academic—there are genuine cases where the sort of worry you're raising applies. I just think, given the evidence we have, this isn't one. It's just a company making an economic decision, and there's not much interesting to be said about it. Happy to drop the issue from here on out so the thread can go more directly back to your intended topic.
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Unread 06-11-2020, 03:20 PM
Mark McDonnell Mark McDonnell is offline
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Well, I do know what you mean, Aaron. They're motivated purely by the bottom line. But if we accept it's a simple economic decision that suggests they think keeping those shows would somehow lose them money. How would that work? Someone somewhere along the line must be looking at this at the level of morality.
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