I think the problem here is that the folks not seeing why this is a problematic cover are assuming that racism=lynchings and voting rights and slavery. And the magazine cover in and of itself isn’t the problem, IMO–it’s more of a symptom of the general idea that being Caucasian is the most visible and mainstream thing in this country. This isn’t a huge issue on par with Emmit Till. But it is a problem that many young girls think blond hair/blue eyes=gorgeous. It’s just the message that you don’t really count if you’re not.
Don’t be afraid of the word racism, though, is what I would say. I can understand several posters’ tendencies to find something to call it other than racism, but that’s because since we almost never lynch anybody anymore, racism is a dirty word. It used to connote violence and riots and explosive hatred and worse, and that stuff happens far less frequently these days.
Doesn’t mean something that’s racist isn’t racist, and an institutional preference for one race over another based on racially-inherent characteristics is racism of the most indisputable kind. So if you think that’s what’s going on, what the hell, call it racist.
edit: er, I mean “me too.”
Exactly. People of color exist. We’re in every facet of society. That includes the world of entertainment. African-Americans, Hispanic-Americans and Asian-Americans are 1/3 of the population, but they couldn’t find one non-white woman of any sort to put on this cover… it speaks to a laziness, an unwillingness to think outside of a box that was constructed and reinforced by racism, an inability to look at people who don’t look like the editorial staff of Vanity Fair (a very homogeneous group) as people who have merit, who have something to offer, who are equals.
Just as soon as I read the thread title, I predicted the outcome of this thread. “Is this racist?” is just begging for dictionary deuling rather than a substantive discussion about the implications of a particular trend, which is what it seems the OP is looking for. It’s like a clarion call to semantitists who think Merriam-Webster–and not common sense–is the arbiter of good and bad.
Currently I’m in the Democratic Republic of Congo on business. It’s my second trip to Africa (the first was to Ethiopia) and both times have been an eye-opening experience in more ways than one. One thing jumps out at me (and its minor, but still it jumps out) is that there are so many beautiful women here, at least in Kinshasa. I mean, like everywhere I go, I see women who would put at least 75% of American chicks to shame…white, black, whatever. I feel like I’m surrounded by Naomi Campbells, honestly.
I felt the same way when I was in the Dominican Republic. Gorgeous women everywhere. Ethiopia? Same dang thing.
And it’s sad to say, but the only reason why I think these observations are noteworthy is because the way I’ve been programmed through exposure to American media. When all you’re mainly fed are images of white leading ladies, white super models, and white sex symbols–or, black women that just so happen to be light-skinned and straight-haired with itty bitty noses–it’s easy to go around thinking (even subconsciously) that beauty in a form other than pale skin, straight hair, and Europeanized features (both body and face) is a rare, exceptional thing. Even though I’m probably not as myopic in that department compared to your typical American, I still have been affected by Hollywoods narrow-minded view of what is considered mainstream. As evident by the fact that I’m left with my mouth open when I see how bountiful beauty is in a place where the average person is the farthest thing away from Euro-looking you could possibly get.
What suddenly comes to mind is one rather obnoxious thread in recent memory in which posters were actually left debating (and I say, “left debating” because for some reason the moderators kept the thread in GD instead of moved it to IMHO…the cynic in me says this would not have done this if the subject was about any ethic/racial group, but hey, I’m open to being convinced otherwise) about the attractiveness of black women relative to whites and other people. It was clear to me at the time of that thread that the only way someone could ask such a thing is if their exposure to other peoples was limited, but international travel has really made this understanding laughably clearer for me.
In the US, in one of the most diverse countries on the planet, it’s weird that the leading lady in movies heralded as the “romantic-comedy of the year!!” are almost invariably white (or non-Hispanic white to be extra precise). I look at threads on the SDMB in which actresses regarded as goddesses or somesuch are discussed and debated, and the names mentioned almost always belong to white actresses. Not even in threads about “what celebrities look great for their age?” do non-whites get mentioned much even though you’d think at least Tina Turner would be an obvious answer (Sade and Patti Labelle are also doing the damn thing). It makes you wonder: do people just not know about non-white celebrities other than those on the mega-super star level (Will Smith, Halle etc)? Or do they see non-whites as uninteresting/not popular enough/gravita-less, and therefore choose not to pay attention to them?
Jimmy Chitwood, America Ferrera is less a TV actress than Amanda Seyfried is. Of her 21 IMDb credits, at least half are movies. She’s also an executive producer. Amanda Seyfried is an ex-TV soap actress who has now made it into films. America Ferrera started in films and has branched out into television.
We do tend to throw around the words “racist” and “racism” far too much, though. Don’t like rap? You’re racist. Don’t want to live in an inner city ghetto? You’re racist. The waitress accidentally served the white customers before the black? She’s racist. You get the idea.
I don’t want to make excuses for Vanity Fair, but there has always been an old-school Northeast Corridor WASP mentality air about the publication.
That post was actually by Justin_Bailey. I’m sure there are thousands of posters who needed me to make that correction before they could go on with their days, but I suppose my ego compels it. I actually don’t know anything about either actress.
elmwood, my point is that racism is still racism whether or not people are tired of hearing about it. You disagree?
I kind of see the opposite here, to be honest. I see a lot of people often bending over backwards NOT to see racism. Biggirl (who’s black) posted about her teenage daughter working as a cashier and a customer berating her daughter, saying that “You people always screw things up,” etc. Biggirl pitted the woman, saying she was pissed about the bigotry shown, and a lot of people posted that they really didn’t get that this was racist when to a lot of others, “you people” is basically code for “I don’t like your skin color and I’m going to make you feel bad about it.”
I’ve also seen posts replying to questions like “Why is there still racism” with the response of all the things that black people need to stop doing to give themselves a bad name. That if black people like Kanye didn’t act like assholes, posters wouldn’t have to think “N-word” when they saw a black person doing something “wrong.”
And I’ve seen at least one poster (a while ago, granted) saying that Bill O’Reilly’s reaction that in Sylvia’s in Harlem, there were no screaming cursing black people (but rather, a polite, well-mannered black clientele) surprised him was a really nice thing to say and why are people jumping all over this guy for being so damned open minded?
And let’s not forget the, “Why do black people do x” threads? The one that you with the face linked to (are black women less attractive) is another example of a “I can’t believe someone SAID that” moment for me.
I’m not saying that there’s nothing but racism on this boards. But in my experience, I kind of feel like it’s less that people throw around racism and more that as soon as someone alleges racism that many people jump in to show why it’s not really racist and liberals just have too much time on their hands.
So sorry! I was reading your post right before I wrote mine and completely forgot who was who.
Well, all white people look alike, so I can’t really blame you.
Are you patrician-looking with a cute little button nose?
I’m a conservative white male, but I’ll go you one better. How many celebrity black women are actually dark? Don’t give me the line about how they’re harder to light, Hollywood/Madison Avenue/fashion industry. I honestly think that there’s an unconscious racism, in that the more African-black someone looks, the more the American entertainment industry thinks, “Hmmm… that wasn’t what I had in mind for this…” I think that was going on in the NFL, too. “Somehow that’s just not what I had in mind for my coaching job. I wonder why I didn’t take a shine to that guy.”
America Ferrera has 19 completed credits. Two are short films, three are TV movies, two are TV show guest spots, one is a regular TV gig, one is a cartoon voiceover and there’s a smattering of bit parts in mostly unseen movies.
Her three starring roles are in Real Women Have Curves (which I’ve heard is an excellent movie) and the two Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants movies. Which are alright, but aren’t earth-shattering unless you’re a teen girl.
You’ll get no argument from me that she’s a good actress, but I don’t think her resume is what Vanity Fair was looking for for this article.
This needs to be repeated over and over again until people actually understand what it means. For those saying, “well Ebony was created for just this reason, that’s why they never feature white people”, the same applies to Vanity Fair. It didn’t set out to be the voice of white America, but pretending it ever tried to appeal to everyone is ridiculous. It’s designed to appeal to upper crust old white ladies and that’s not racist on its face.
In other news, The racial income gap is wider than in the 1970’s, and 10% of African American males between 25 and 29 are in prison, but it’s good to see people sticking up for beautiful young millionaires like Zoe Saldana.
I have no idea where you’re coming from.
I live in Philadelphia, where I’m privy to much of the blatent racism from the white population towards the large black, South American immigrant, and Korean immigrant populations here (sometimes I feel like white racists feel especially comfortable exposing their bigotry to me because I look so super-WASPy).
I’ve also seen and heard first hand many non-white people experiencing blatent racism, and their reactions to it (it’s rare that it doesn’t provoke strong emotion).
Incidents such as those you describe, I’ve never seen, unless you count the running joke ‘it’s because I’m black, right?’ which is entirely tongue in cheek although based on a painful amount of truth.
Seems to me that one’s invariably rather subjective choice about what young starlets most appeal as eye-candy may indeed be racist, but it’s a racism not really that subject to education. You can’t make people who find starlets with white skin prefer starlets with black skin if they don’t.
Same with the oft-noted Asian dichotomy - that many white guys like starlets who are Asian, but white women, as a whole, do not prefer young actors who are Asian. I suppose that’s racist either way, but I don’t see that much can practically be done about the injustice done to young (male) Asian stars, or indeed the larger issue that young Asian males do not appear to have the same mass appeal to the non-Asian population that their sisters do.
This in contrast to other, more overt forms of discrimination - you can more easily require equitable hiring practices, etc.
[I myself like starlets of any colour! ;)]
Ah, good. So now we’ve got the “this isn’t a big enough problem because racism is dead” and the “this isn’t a big enough problem, racism is far worse than this” reasons why the OP shouldn’t have been created.
Some of us would prefer to spend our time actually talking about the symptoms of the problem than endlessly compare them to other symptoms. Jesus. You really think this thread is about Zoe Saldana specifically? You don’t think that maybe the magazine cover is a high-profile manifestation of the same mindset that leads to the income gap in the first place? I mean, if not, then whatever, you don’t, maybe you could talk about that or not say anything at all, but it’s pretty tiresome and absolutely needless for you to post something like the above as if we all get one issue to talk about for a given week and we’ve all wasted ours on this thread.
It’s also pretty damned frustrating, for instance, to be lectured about “real” racism and sticking up for millionaires when I spend all day every day trying to keep young black males out of prison.
You know, if you want attractive, young, sexually alluring, dark (and multi-coloured) skinned ladies to ogle at (and c’mon guys, who doesn’t) stop paying attention to the mainstream American Hollywood/Madison Avenue/fashion/entertainment industry and just tune into any mainstream African-American youth targeted media (1, 2, 3).
Or just turn on any hip hop music video ever made…
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…Teairra Marí! (0:30, 1:14, and 1:29) Please return my letters! We could be so happy together! runs off crying