In a vacuum, perhaps. And while Seinfeld was certainly not out of the ordinary at the time, in hindsight it was wrong for them (and many or most similar shows) to not take action against the bias in the entertainment world that generally, but not always, discriminated against black entertainers and in favor of white entertainers.
So it’s anti-that person. It’s not anti-her religion. Tricking someone into betraying es religious values isn’t by itself an attack on the religion. It might just be an attack on that person. And he made that attack not because of her religion, but because (in his view) she harmed him.
During the Iraq War there were reports that US military folks would try to mess with potential terrorists by smearing them with pigs blood. Would you argue that that practice wasn’t Islamophobic, but rather was anti-those potential terrorists?
Again, you are wrong. This is not a hypothetical, it’s better than reality because we know everything there is to know about George Costanza and we know his motivations and they weren’t based on hate. End of story, no hate, no hate crime.
I would say that in that case, there is probably enough evidence (if we bothered to gather it) to show that it was both. If we interview those soldiers, and the other soldiers around them, we can probably get a very clear picture that they harbored anti-Islamic feelings and often spoke and acted in such terms, and even that they lived in a social condition where anti-Islamicism was common. In the case of George Costanza, because it is a work of fiction, and George’s motives and feelings are fully displayed, we can be much more confident that he didn’t do it as an anti-Semitic act.
Seems to me the question might be whether or not it’s ok to portray how much of an asshole a character is through the character’s bigotry or racism? I mean what George did was definitely assholish, but I viewed it as more of a way to portray just how much of a dick he is, in that he’d use someone’s religious food prohibitions as a weapon against them personally, and not as something that he’s doing because she’s Jewish.
And if I’m not mistaken, the woman’s breaking of the Kosher food laws would be permissible because she wasn’t aware that she was eating lobster, and it wasn’t her negligence that caused her to break the laws.
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Seems to me the question might be whether or not it’s ok to portray how much of an asshole a character is through the character’s bigotry or racism?[/quote]
I don’t see why not, but again, in this case there was no bigotry or racism. We know that for a fact. George did not hate that woman for being Jewish.
Exactly.
Not really relevant, it doesn’t mitigate George’s actions in any way.
My apologies – I wasn’t replying to you specifically. Yours was the last post in the thread when I began mine.
That’s an odd interpretation of what I said. I don’t seek offense. But I do actively analyse almost every piece of art I experience, and I find what I find.
Watching Seinfeld made me feel depressed, almost dirty; complicit in something inhumane. So I asked myself why. It’s more of a self analysis, really, than an exegesis. It’s absolutely not a fishing exhibition in search of turds, if you’ll allow a mixed metaphor.
Otherwise you’re suggesting that whenever you find something distasteful it’s an act of dishonesty.
Gotta disagree. Just like intentional bigotry, incidental bigotry is a result of ignorance. In this day and age, ignorance is an active choice. Apathy toward educating yourself to live in modern society is an act of volition.
He still has no hatred or even dislike for Jews in general or the religion. So it is not bigotry. Ignorance by itself does not make a hate crime. His ignorance was clearly a choice, to be ignorant of human decency. He still did not try to harm this woman because she was Jewish nor is there any reason to think so. It is not a hate crime to hate a person for personal reasons unrelated to their membership in some group. Even if the crime itself was more likely to fall into the category of a hate crime, the hate part is still missing. There must be some kind of bias or animosity toward the group a person is a member of or it’s not a hate crime.
- That’s because of the topic of the thread
- Sort of - some shows are more widely agreed to be offensive than others. They can still be popular despite or even because of the various isms they put on show, like the BBT is.
Once again: a choice of ignorance and apathy is based on assumptions about what groups are worth learning about and which are worthy of not giving a fuck about. Ingrained cultural racism is still racism, and continued ignorance and apathy is a choice
There’s active aggressive racism, and there’s the passive racism of privilege and apathy.
You’re focusing the adjectives and not the noun.
I don’t know what you are having difficulty understanding. Hate crimes don’t include crimes against people because they have seen you naked. George did not target any social group or racial demographic. And again, in this case it is something we know for a fact, so all of your speculation has no bearing on the subject.
The fact someone is actively analysing stuff that’s not actually intended to be analysed (a sitcom, for example) would, I suggest, be at least a subconscious form of offence seeking.
If (generic) you has to really stop and think and analyse something before concluding that it’s distasteful, I’d suggest they’re being at least slightly dishonest about said distaste.
I’m not talking about obviously, on the face of it, distasteful stuff - like, say, a gory horror movie, but rather stuff that (like Seinfeld) is pretty clearly benign unless someone starts going through it with a metaphorical magnifying glass.
You’fe twisting my words, and then calling me dizshonest.
Not gonna chase your goallosts all over rbe field.
Here are the goal posts. Not moving them at all.
Indeed–the silly back and forth about the lobster going on in this thread for example–George was not portrayed as a benevolent figure in that incident, and in fact the main four characters on Seinfeld commit a number of crimes throughout the show’s run, and never show remorse or guilt for anything. The show is about four obnoxious people and there is never a moment in its 8 year run where they are portrayed in-universe as benevolent, they are at their best hapless putzes, at their worst they stray into malevolence and criminality. There is a reason the show ends with them in prison for a relatively minor crime.
Yep–hate crimes are intrinsically linked to the motivation of the perpetrator. If I run a bakery and someone asks if a product is kosher, and I lie and say it is because a) I want to make the sale and b) I am too lazy or too cheap to provide genuine kosher items; that is not a hate crime. I have defrauded my customer for purpose of financial gain, which is a crime, but I did not do it out of a hatred of Jews, simply greed. George likewise is motivated to get “revenge” on someone for seeing him naked and then laughing at the size of his penis.
That’s not what I understood @lissener to be saying. Rather, as I understand it, he felt that it was distasteful, and therefore he tried to stop and think and analyze why it was distasteful.
Which is the appropriate response to being bothered by something, or finding it offensive or distasteful. Too many people jump immediately from “I’m bothered by this” to “this is demonstrably, protestably offensive.” But that’s not the only possible conclusion. If you find something you’re watching (or reading or listening to) offensive, it could mean one of several things:
- It genuinely is offensive.
- The characters are saying or doing offensive things, but that’s the point: you’re supposed to be bothered. The attitude of the show toward these actions is not one of approval.
- You’re projecting your own issues onto the show, or misunderstanding or missing the context of what’s being depicted.
- The straw that broke the camel’s back: it’s just one more example of something that’s too common. For example, there’s nothing necessarily wrong with a show about white people, or with a dumb blonde character. But there is something wrong if most shows are about white people or most blonde characters are portrayed as dumb.