Hell…I’ve been doing this for weeks while watching the political stuff on tv. I’m here by myself and I’ll be walking to the kitchen when McCain says something, and I just yell FUCK YOU! at the TV and go on about my business.
-
I’ve heard of this and seen it portrayed in some movies. I’ve also been in a few loud theaters but have been unable to distinguish whether the people screaming were black or not. Like the OP said, interaction from the crowd CAN be (and has been) fun during some movies.
-
Never heard of this. Now that you mention it, however, a disproportionate amount of bathrooms in places with large Hispanic populations are dirtier. Not sure if this is because they make more of a mess or they just don’t get cleaned as often because they are in poorer neighborhoods.
I worked my way through school at a restuarant with a large hispanic workforce. I seen this with older workers, but not so much from the younger ones.
I’ve experienced both, and I also agree both are cultural stereotypes rather than racial. (tho’ some aren’t too clear on that concept, so it gets put down to race)
Love that scene from Scary Movie…classic, and only a slight exageration, ime (both the woman’s behavior and volume and what her fellow moviegoers wanted to do to her)
Yep, the bathroom thing is because of cultural differences to do with plumbing and not flushing tp. And it’s filthy, wads of used tp in the trash or on the floor, you feel like you run the risk of contracting hepatitis every time you have to use the toilet, disgusting!
Lots of workplaces and public restrooms in stores in Texas have signs up in Spanish asking that you please put tp in the toilet. Sometimes it helps, sometimes not.
Another thing I learned is that a lot of Mexican women seem to be in the habit of using rolled up tp instead of pads. And them flushing them, often backing up the toilet. (have witnessed the results of this myself and heard the same from a few busniness owners, who also hate it because they go through rolls of tp very fast.)
Um, ok, so you toss the shitty tp on the floor or in the trash for everyone to see/smell, but the HUGE wad of bloody tp goes into the toilet.
Anyway, both are stereotypes but both have a basis in reality.
#2 definitely. This is gross.
At my DOCTOR’S office, the restroom has a sign on the wall to “put toilet paper in the trash can”. It’s disgusting! You would think, in a brand new office building, the plumbing would work properly! What’s worse, is that the trash can was a large open one, fully displaying all the shit stained and pee stained toilet paper.:smack: But alas, it is cultural. My area is over 90% Mexican. (not that there’s anything wrong with that)
I also saw evidence of this in the employee bathrooms at my jobs at various hospitals. (used by the nursing staff).
I don’t know about #2.
As for #1, I would say I have experienced it.
Harlem Nights in West Philadelphia. Everyone was yelling at the screen. Couldn’t a damn thing. Although I’ve heard I missed precious little.
And Pulp Fiction at the Ritz. Although on that occasion, the loudmouths were asked to leave.
In the movie Malibu’s Most Wanted, they took a “black-acting” white guy to a movie to test whether they had succeeded in getting him to “act white.” To spoil this cinematic masterpiece for you, they realized they failed when he stood up and yelled at the screen.
I’ve definitely experienced #1 before. Some movies aren’t worth seeing unless you’re going to watch them in a theater with a mostly-black audience.
Any modern slasher movie falls under this umbrella.
Just to add, it’s also been my experience that Mexicans tend to ruin a movie…WTF? They come in, all 13 of them, bring all their kids including the toddlers in diapers, and let them run wild, talk, get up, move around, all through the film.
Yes, a stereotype and NOT racial but cultural. Hello! It’s called a RENTAL! Go watch it at home. This is not your living room.
I also agree that certain films, it is a blast to have a loud, participating audience. Like The last Pirates of the Carribean or Grindhouse, both I saw on opening night and both had loud, appreciative crowds and it was fun.
But when you go to an opening night, you expect that. When I pay $10 to see a movie I’d like to hear, I get a bit miffed when I can’t.
You might get raked over the coals for this, and I’ve never seen this at a movie, but it happens at my work. As parents, please don’t give seven kids the run of the convenience store. It makes my job much more stressful. And how do two parents handle so many kids? I’d slit my wrists if my wife had TWINS, for Christ’s sake…
Joe
Well, I just might get raked over a few coals, but after spending about 7 years in SE Texas recently (aka North Mexico) I stand firm in my observation of this cultural phenomenon. Again, NOT a racial thing (I know many Hispanic families and Black ones ftm who would never dream of disrupting a movie theater OR not disposing of their tp properly.)
So rake away. 
I doubt I’ll get raked over the coals, but here’s for equal opportunities.
The only people I’ve ever seen let their kids run wild at a movie theater was a white couple. Being the scary brown woman (puertorican), I just stepped in the path of a running child and told him to get back to his seat before I made him.
Worked like a charm.
This is making me laugh. In my grocery store, lil’ white kids cuttin’ a stone fool in the aisles is a common sight. More than once I have tried to catch their eye and give them a ‘big scary black woman’ stare.
Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. When they are having one of their all out tantrums, it never works.
#2 I have never heard of somehow, until now.
#1 I see all the time. It drives me crazy, but by golly, I know my brothas and sistas just can’t help it. That damn woman should kick off her 3 inch heels if she doesn’t want the monster to catch her.
Yeah. I used to see lots of movies in a mostly black neighborhood, and there seemed to be more interaction when the audience was mostly black (which wasn’t always the case–some movies at the same theatre had a mostly white audience). While I wouldn’t say it was disruptive, people might say that. I found it friendly. It was less a hell of a lot less interaction than at the midnight showings of the Rocky Horror Picture Show.
They tended to applaud more, too. Spontaneous applause while great things happened. For instance (and the only one I can think of) the train wreck in The Fugitive.
Originally posted by Knead to Know:
" they had to be taught to flush their toilet paper. "
I have experienced exactly the opposite. At one time I used to spend a lot of time in a coffee house in Taipei. So did a lot of other foreigners. It was near the school. Some of us taught our native languages over a cup of coffee for extra money. One day a sign appeared in the bathroom: “please do not flush your toilet paper”. It was because the plumbing couldn’t handle it. There was a trash can there for the TP.
I’m embarrassed to say #1 is true. I haven’t gone to a theatre to see a movie in a few years, and that’s one of the reasons. I agree with others that it’s cultural.
I’ve never heard of #2
#1 is true. I’m Black, and I used to decide where to watch movies based on a few factors:
a) If I wanted to sit in a stadium seat
b) If I didn’t care about hearing dialogue and wanted to be entertained by people talking at the screen
For a) I would go to the White movie theatre. For b) it was the Aquarius on Riverside Drive, which was full of Black folk. Or the dollar theatre. For b) it was typically for second-rate movies or comedies. I saw Who’s The Man starring Ed Lover and Doctor Dre at the Black theatre - the comments to the screen were funnier than the movie.
Fast forward several years and I’m at a theatre in Harvard Square. We go to watch Hustle & Flow and I’m with my Black friends. We’re all graduate students at Harvard… but we could not behave ourselves and just watch the movie. We had to talk to the screen! (Not loud though.)
Things guaranteed to start Black folks talking in the theatre:
- Somebody getting slapped in the face
- Same-sex kissing
- A character doing something dumb (walking into a graveyard at midnight, walking into a burning building to save a cat)
- Interracial kissing (especially with a Black man kissing a White woman)
- A Zapp & Roger song in the background (“that’s my jam!”)
Hey there, Austin Lived there for 6 yrs or so and remains one of my 2 “homes”. Portland, Or. being the other. (from Houston originally)
I love your breakdown of the risks for loud talking out…true. Very apt.
And don’t get me wrong, I LOVE my Black brothers and sisters, grew up among them and laugh at those who fear them on general principle, but yeah, certain stereotypes ARE true, ime. These are people I feel comfortable with BUT, come the fuck ON, SHUT the fuck UP already! :mad: I would not feel as comfortable saying that if I DIDN’T love them so much, ya know?
Same with my loud White-trash family of origin. :o
I love both cultures, but there are aspects of both I hate. And I would as gladly stab to death a White person being loud in a theater as I would a Black one. 
I’ve experienced both of the OP’s with some decent frequency. Funny thing regarding #2 is that whenever I watched a movie in Mexico, I never got that problem.
Never heard of #2 and I have quite a number of undocumented Hispanic friends. However I often heard complaints from the secretary at my old job about all of the Asians working in the building who didn’t know how to use an American toilet. They would apparently actually put their feet on the rim and squat, making a big mess.
I’ve heard of #1, even before seeing scary movie but haven’t really experienced it personally. I do witness the same phenomenon within certain groups of teens.