The Empire Strikes Back is the best Star Wars movie. Or is it? — Page 9

timdiggerm said:

Ah but those were a gift, considered an antique, no? Conveniently, they were pretty old when he sold them in the 80s in IV.

Hey, you said "no one."  You are making the rules here, not me.

I'll bet you don't like Chewbacca either.  Hell, you probably don't think ESB is the best Star Wars movie.

THAT'S IT, I'M OUTTA HERE!!!

That glasses guy looks like Roy 'Chubby' Brown

J

timdiggerm said:

CP3S said:

Bingowings said:

Racial epithets are only bigoted when they are attached to a history of repression.

No.

Example?

Were you asking for me to give an example of racism without a history of repression?

The very idea that a history of repression must be involved in order for something to be racist is absolutely ridiculous.

In his attempt at splitting hairs, I think Bingo is overlooking the fact that prejudice usually coincides with oppressive actions, which is probably why he has a hard time separating the too. But that doesn't mean you can't have racism without oppression, it is just improbable. It is rare that one comes without the other. You say there is no movement for the rights of fat people, that is only because there are no rights that they are being withheld from them that they need to fight for. Doesn't mean people are not prejudice against them. Just ask any obese person and they will tell you about the crap they put up with. This isn't racism simply because weight has nothing to do with race.

It is ludicrous to say that calling someone from Japan "slant eyes" wouldn't be racist had we not thrown them into prison camps post-Pearl Harbor, or some other such nonsense. Prejudice against one race by another, no matter how major or minor, verbal or physical, is still racism.

Anyway, I am pretty sure Bingo is just having a laugh at this point; which is why I originally only answered his prior comment with "No". I have a sneaking suspicion he doesn't even believe what he is saying. So the above post was more for the benefit of others. To fall back into ridiculous fanboyishness: evidence of the prejudice against Wookies is present in the original films. Beside the "Where are you taking this... thing" and probably some other small things I am forgetting, Boba Fett's costume features "braided Wookie scalps", which definitely gives us the indication that there is in fact some degree of oppression.

I think he does have a point though in that certain terms are considered racist only at certain periods of time. The meaning of the word gets reappropriated. So if you called someone a negro today I think most people would say that is racist, or at the very least politically incorrect, whereas 80 years ago it was not only considered not racist but actually was the proper term to describe Africans and was used in scholarly works. But eventually it started falling out of favour and now it would be considered racist if you used it. So, the percieved racism of words is entirely dependant on the historical context in which they are used.

This probably doesn't have much to do with Leia, though, as she was clearly angry at Chewie and deliberately talking down to him and everyone else. I still don't see how that would make her speciesist or whatever, even if she may technically be making a comment on his appearance. It's like when Han calls him a "furry oaf". He has lots of hair, it's a distinguishing feature, otherwise if that's speciesist then commenting on any physical trait would be speciest since everyone's physical traits are determined by virtue of their species and are not optional. The Death Star commander, on the other hand, calling Chewie a "thing" is pretty clearly speciesist since he doesn't even acknowledge that wookies are "people" but instead refers to him as an object.

zombie84 said:

I think he does have a point though in that certain terms are considered racist only at certain periods of time. The meaning of the word gets reappropriated. So if you called someone a negro today I think most people would say that is racist, or at the very least politically incorrect, whereas 80 years ago it was not only considered not racist but actually was the proper term to describe Africans and was used in scholarly works.

But that doesn't have anything to do with what he was saying. "Negro" simply means "black", but since it was used as a degrading term for so long, like you said, it was reappropriated.

But that is simply a linguistic phenomenon. Prior to the word "negro" becoming a taboo racial slur, it was still possible to be racist (obviously). Racism is the attitude and the way of thinking, not the words used. Words can merely be used to convey racist thought (such as suggestions that someone different from the speaker is somehow a lesser being).

Simply put, racism is the belief some races are superior to others. Oppression is not a prerequisite, but a common side effect.

A carpet is an "object", how is that much better than being called, "a thing"? Sure, you can describe someone's physical features without racial connotations, but when you are putting a negative spin on those features ("raghead", for example, obviously isn't a positive descriptor, no matter how you look at it), you really can't excuse it with lack of history of repression or with it simply being the way they look (turbans really do look like rags).

Hey, any number of those Stormtroopers could be women... ;)  Just so long as they are taller than Luke.

atack of the clones is the best because it has explosions and yoda fighting and boba fett and jango fett and clone troopers fighting and anakin fighting and it has a happy ending because the clones come in and help save the jedi from the bad guys and its realy cool

Don't forget the wedding!

Puggo - Jar Jar's Yoda said:

Bingowings said:

Racial epithets are only bigoted when they are attached to a history of repression.

So when American kids would tell "Polack jokes", that wasn't bigoted?

Poland is a country not a race and it has many ethnic groups and a long history of being repressed.

Making such comments is pretty much like telling Irish jokes in England (as opposed to telling Irish jokes in Ireland), or telling jokes about stingy booze crazed Scotsmen who only eat bizarre fried food.

I stand corrected. (NSFW language)

Puggo - Jar Jar's Yoda said:

Bingowings said:

Puggo - Jar Jar's Yoda said:

Bingowings said:

Racial epithets are only bigoted when they are attached to a history of repression.

So when American kids would tell "Polack jokes", that wasn't bigoted?

Poland is a country not a race and it has many ethnic groups and a long history of being repressed.

So I'm confused.  If an epithet is racial, it is only bigotted if it is attached to a history of repression, but if an epithet is nationalistic in nature, is it bigoted or not?  And if it can only be bigoted if there is oppression, does that oppression have to come from the country of the person telling the epithet, or could it come from someone from another country? The reason I ask, is that I have been unable to find a definition from any dictionary that links and restricts bigotry specifically to repression.

Like anything it's contextual.

Some nationalistic epithets are de-facto racial epithets and are frequently just as offensive because of a shared history of racism more than the nation being singled out.

In Britain calling someone originating from the Indian Subcontinent a "Paki" is as offensive as calling a person of African origin by the N-Word even though it's a short form of the national word Pakistani.

This is because the term is used to target racial abuse towards people originating from the whole region regardless of the actual country but like the N-Word some of these terms used by one group to offend an historically repressed group have been adopted within the group as a badge of solidarity.

An Irishman in England might call another Irishman a Mick without offense but if a Englishman called an Irishman a Mick without some sort of understanding it probably would cause deep historically rooted offense in a very different context to an Aussie calling an Englishman "a whinging Pom".

That isn't to say that an Englishman in Australia would never be offended by such name calling but it would a different form of offense as Australia hasn't got a long history of holding down the English (outside the world of sport).

Some offensive terms based on superficial differences are regionally specific.

Watching Buffy The Vampire Slayer used to be a bit problematic in Britain because Americans don't use the term "Spastic" or "Spaz" in the same way it has been used here.

"Spaz" in Britain is a term used to target people suffering with Cerebral Palsy and "Spastic" by the mid-seventies had become so commonly used as a derogatory term that the National Spastic Society eventually felt it necessary to change it's name to SCOPE. 

Jawas seem to be a fully sentient species with a culture and a language so is Threepio being racist when he calls them "Disgusting creatures"?

I think he is.

They almost certainly have individuals, they are indigenous people who live on the fringes of Tatooine society so labelling them all disgusting creatures based on his experience with a few of them sounds pretty racey to me.

Puggo wrote:

TV's Frink said:

I stand corrected. (NSFW language)

AWESOME!!!  I love the part when he discusses Han telling Chewie he has to look after Leia.

I was disappointed that the t-shirt was a lie.  (having nothing to do with Peter Mayhew)