# We need to call out inherent racism in explicit terms **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [December 13, 2014, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083 "2014-12-13T01:40:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2014, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083/161 "2014-12-16T20:45:43Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > They do–but [let’s look at the data.](http://www.bunchecenter.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/2014-Hollywood-Diversity-Report-2-12-14.pdf) > > This is the context in which criticism is made. When so many movies are made that are disproportionately white (again, almost 90% of movies fall into this category), any effort made to diversify casts, such as Elba being a Norse god, can be applauded, while efforts made to eliminate roles for minority actors, such as casting white actors in the roles of Egyptians, might be condemned. > > Context matters. It also matters because disparities like these are self-perpetuating. Christian Bale gets chosen to play the lead in a blockbuster movie. This makes him more likely to get chosen for the next blockbuster hit, which makes him more likely to win an Academy Award, which makes him even more likely to star in another blockbuster hit. So that when a non-white actor comes along and auditions for a lead role, he’s likely going to be rejected. Why? Because he’s not a Christian Bale. Duh! We need a guy like him if this film’s going to be a blockbuster. No one wants to pay $13 for No-Name Brownface. I’ve never been a fan of the Oscars for this reason. If you don’t look like the film industry’s idea of a “leading man”, you will never get “Best Actor”. Talent doesn’t enter into the equation. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2014, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083/162 "2014-12-16T20:48:37Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > It also matters because disparities like these are self-perpetuating. Christian Bale gets chosen to play the lead in a blockbuster movie. This makes him more likely to get chosen for the next blockbuster hit, which makes him more likely to win an Academy Award, which makes him even more likely to star in another blockbuster hit. > > So that when a non-white actor comes along and auditions for a lead role, he’s likely going to be rejected. Why? Because he’s not a Christian Bale. Duh! We need a guy like him if this film’s going to be a blockbuster. No one wants to pay $13 for No-Name Brownface. > > I’ve never been a fan of the Oscars for this reason. If you don’t look like the film industry’s idea of a “leading man”, you will never get “Best Actor”. Talent doesn’t enter into the equation. This is a rather good and intuitive example of how societal racism can be perpetuated without actual individual racists. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2014, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083/163 "2014-12-16T21:01:32Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > So that when a non-white actor comes along and auditions for a lead role, he’s likely going to be rejected. Why? Because he’s not a Christian Bale. Duh! We need a guy like him if this film’s going to be a blockbuster. No one wants to pay $13 for No-Name Brownface. Oh, c’mon, Hollywood doesn’t think like that, nobody in Hollywood would say > [@Ridley Scott](#): > > I can’t mount a film of this budget … and say that my lead actor is Mohammad so-and-so from such-and-such. I’m just not going to get it financed. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2014, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083/164 "2014-12-16T21:40:39Z")
D’oh! ---
**Author:** ![you\_with\_the\_face](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/ecccb3/32.png) [@you\_with\_the\_face](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/you_with_the_face)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2014, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083/165 "2014-12-16T22:31:30Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > This is a rather good and intuitive example of how societal racism can be perpetuated without actual individual racists. Yup, and Hollywood isn’t particularly unique in this regard. It mirrors what happens everywhere else. ---
**Author:** ![Steophan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steophan/32/9595_2.png) [@Steophan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steophan)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2014, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083/166 "2014-12-17T00:05:18Z")
> [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](#): > > Ooh, here’s one - Cassandra Cain, AKA the best Batgirl. She was Asian. Shame she wasn’t around very long and got retconned out of existence with the new 52. You’re right that she was the best Batgirl. I think she’s supposed to still exist in the current continuity, as Black Bat in Japan - certainly that’s where she was at the end of Batman Inc. As for non-white Batman heroes, you have both Batwings (who were black), the Native American Man-Of-Bats and his sidekick Little Raven, the whole of the Super Young Team, and the current (although temporarily dead) Robin, the half-Arabic son of Bruce Wayne and Talia Al-Ghul. One of the most interesting characters in recentish, but pre-New 52 Gotham was Renee Montoya, a hispanic police officer turned vigilante as The Question. She, along with her black police partner Crispus Allen (later The Spectre) are also featured in the Gotham TV show. ---
**Author:** ![D\_Anconia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/67e7ee/32.png) [@D\_Anconia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D_Anconia)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2014, 2:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083/167 "2014-12-17T02:20:43Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > Maybe make a movie set in Africa, about Africans, that features people with melanin in their skins doing something besides playing trees in the background? Is this really too much to ask? The movie was filmed primarily in Spain. How many Egyptian actors live there, or have work permits? I’m guessing it’s a relatively small number. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2014, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083/168 "2014-12-17T02:25:18Z")
Oh, right. That’s why they relied on local Spanish actors to fill all the major roles, because studios have no experience with obtaining visas and work permits. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2014, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083/169 "2014-12-17T02:35:45Z")
> [@D\_Anconia](#): > > The movie was filmed primarily in Spain. How many Egyptian actors live there, or have work permits? I’m guessing it’s a relatively small number. I’m giggling now at the idea that this was some sort of local fuckin indie picture, the dream of some student at a Valencia film school or something, that they just gathered a bunch of their pals together to cast the film, and really, how could they be expected to find somebody nonwhite? ---
**Author:** ![Jragon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e19b73/32.png) [@Jragon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jragon)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2014, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083/170 "2014-12-17T02:52:55Z")
> [@you\_with\_the\_face](#): > > Yup, and Hollywood isn’t particularly unique in this regard. It mirrors what happens everywhere else. Not racism, but a similar sexist example. I know there was an issue with My Little Pony toys or something where toy retailers refused to stock a specific toy and demanded that the hats be changed to pink or blue rather than the straw color it was in the show because “girls don’t buy things with colors like that.” This, of course, led to little girls complaining that the toy had the wrong hat. Toy stores still stuck to their guns on their market research. ---
**Author:** ![D\_Anconia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/67e7ee/32.png) [@D\_Anconia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D_Anconia)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2014, 2:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083/171 "2014-12-17T02:57:57Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > I’m giggling now at the idea that this was some sort of local fuckin indie picture, the dream of some student at a Valencia film school or something, that they just gathered a bunch of their pals together to cast the film, and really, how could they be expected to find somebody nonwhite? The casting calls, for thousands of actors, were held in Spain and the Canary Islands. How many eligible Egyptian actors do you think applied? ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2014, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083/172 "2014-12-17T03:19:31Z")
> [@D\_Anconia](#): > > The casting calls, for thousands of actors, were held in Spain and the Canary Islands. > > How many eligible Egyptian actors do you think applied? So you’re saying Christian Bale, Sigourney Weaver, and Ben Kingley got their roles because they’re Spanish? Dios mio. ---
**Author:** ![andros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e480ec/32.png) [@andros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/andros)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2014, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083/173 "2014-12-17T03:22:48Z")
Well, they might be canaries, I suppose. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2014, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083/174 "2014-12-17T03:51:54Z")
> [@D\_Anconia](#): > > The casting calls, for thousands of actors, were held in Spain and the Canary Islands. > > How many eligible Egyptian actors do you think applied? I love this even more. Those casting calls, they were just like a fact of life, right? The movie producers woke up one morning and noticed all the casting calls for their movie in an overwhelmingly white country, so they said, guess that’s where we’re gonna make the movie, right? I’m reminded of Dan Savage columns in which people write in talking about how they suddenly started humping their dog or peeing on themselves in the bathtub and have no idea how it happened. He gently reminds them that it happens **because they decided to make it happen**. Now you: if you were the movie producer, and you wanted to make sure that your movie about Northern Africa had people in it who looked like they were from Northern Africa, what brilliant decision could you make to make that happen? Edit: to move beyond pure snark, here’s a hint: the third largest country of origin for folks living in Spain is Morocco. Significant numbers of folks from sub-Saharan Africa live in Spain. ---
**Author:** ![D\_Anconia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/67e7ee/32.png) [@D\_Anconia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D_Anconia)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2014, 4:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083/175 "2014-12-17T04:19:50Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > So you’re saying Christian Bale, Sigourney Weaver, and Ben Kingley got their roles because they’re Spanish? > > Dios mio. So, there are three stars, and 4,000 extras. Of course the studio is going to hire the extras locally. This isn’t rocket surgery. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2014, 11:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083/176 "2014-12-17T11:47:46Z")
And again, you can come up with no way the studio execs could have fixed this problem, right? If the producers of Braveheart had decided to film in India, and all the Highlanders looked like Bollywood stars, you would have figured that was inevitable, right? ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2014, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083/177 "2014-12-17T12:55:02Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > And again, you can come up with no way the studio execs could have fixed this problem, right? If the producers of Braveheart had decided to film in India, and all the Highlanders looked like Bollywood stars, you would have figured that was inevitable, right? Also, you forgot the part where non-indian roles are virtually non-existent or delegated to “that guy who dies in the middle” or “the bad guy”. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2014, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083/178 "2014-12-17T15:08:52Z")
> [@Urbanredneck](#): > > So maybe 4 of the dwarves in “The Hobbit” should have been black? Well, why not? ---
**Author:** ![andros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e480ec/32.png) [@andros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/andros)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2014, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083/179 "2014-12-17T15:44:44Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Well, why not? Because real dwarves are white, you reverse racist. ---
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2014, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083/180 "2014-12-17T16:06:00Z")
> [@XT](#): > > Maybe there is some historical context I’m missing here, but just based on the dialogue you are citing in the OP, I’m not seeing the automatic racism either. I agree with ‘luci on that one. Saying that the US police forces face a different challenge than, say, the UK is true…we are a country built on immigrants, and they are an established nation state that has existed for thousands of years and have a more homogenous population and culture. You seem to be automatically jumping to ‘Are other countries’ police forces facing as many niggers that U.S. police are facing?’, which is pretty offensive AND seems kind of a leap to me (again, perhaps you have some context or historic reason to automatically jump to this conclusion?). > > Who says this? I don’t know anyone who says there is no racism at all. Hell, there is racism on all sides, and race is a huge issue in the US and will continue to be for years to come. > > The other side of that coin is folks like you who automatically jump to label someone racist. It’s, to me, a disturbing trend in the debates that have been hitting the board lately in the wake of the tragic events recently by the police. The thing is, it’s thrown around so often in these debates, either openly or in supposed clever innuendo that it’s rapidly losing it’s meaning. When everything that smacks of disagreement is automatically labeled as racism and those who disagree automatically racist then the label itself is diluted to uselessness, and REAL racism allowed to flourish. > > Really? First I’ve heard of that. > > If you call everything you see that disagrees with you a racists then I think it really dilutes whatever it is you are hoping to accomplish. YMMV of course, but unless there is more than what you quoted in the OP I think you are over reacting and jerking your knee…and doing your side a disservice in doing so. > [@Acsenray](#): > > In interviews, Ben Kingsley says “My father was a Gujarat,” in exactly those words. > > However, the second paragraph of the linked article says this: > > So no one has denied that Kingsley is half-Indian. I thought at first it was a reference to lots of people being annoyed that “Ben Kingsley,” with his white skin, had been chosen to play Gandhi. Some people in the early eighties were annoyed about that so much so that it came up now and then on TV. My (23 or so years older) Indian sister-in-law said what are they talking about, he’s Indian? > [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > And again, you can come up with no way the studio execs could have fixed this problem, right? If the producers of Braveheart had decided to film in India, and all the Highlanders looked like Bollywood stars, you would have figured that was inevitable, right? Good point. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-need-to-call-out-inherent-racism-in-explicit-terms/707083.md?page=10)