Is It Racist With A Vengeance: Spaghetti Westerngate
 

To avoid thread derailment, it was suggested that there should be a new thread for this.

1) Is kids playing "Cowboys and Indians" problematic? Given the, let's face it, unarguably violent and horrendous treatment of Native Americans in the Colonial era, is this seemingly innocent childhood game actually making light of very real violence? And does that actually have any real-world implications as they go forward in life?

2) Spaghetti westerns, and even modern films, often have non-Native American actors portraying Native American characters. Obviously, this isn't just confined to that specific example... so what are your thoughts on actors crossing cultural boundaries? Is it OK to portray another race? Is it OK to portray a slightly different country? (Thinking specifically of things like British actors portraying Germans, or to go further afield, quite often South Korean [in fact usually American of SK origin] actors portray other South East Asian nationalities e.g. North K or Vietnamese).

And then where is the lower limit? As, for example, there are for some reason an absolute ****-tonne of British (English yes, and also a strangely large disproportionate number of Scottish and Irish) actors who portray American characters in movies and on TV. Is Benedactyl Cumberberry playing Dr Strange misappropriation? Should Tennant, like Capaldi, have kept his Scottish accent to play Doctor Who instead of going fake SoE?

Chris Hemsworth is an Australian actor, with English/Irish/Scottish/Dutch/German ancestry, who plays a Norse God, with an English accent. :think: where do you start with that one. Maybe you don't have to since he technically plays an alien.


So basically, what are your views on keeping actors "culturally correct"? How important is it, assuming that the characters themselves are authentic, and not negatively stereotypical? Is that more important? (I'd suggest leaving satire out of the mix here as it's a whole different discussion really... just sticking with characters who are supposed to be realistic representations.)

I don't think kids really do play cowboys and Indians anymore nowadays anyway. My kids are 17 and 13 and neither of them ever did, not because it wasn't "PC" cowboys and Indians are just old fashioned I suppose

It's called acting.
The clue is in the name.

That's true, Westerns aren't really a popular genre any more so there probably aren't many kids playing it. I was going to say I remember playing cowboys and indians a couple of times when I was young - but I've just remembered that we actually played "Back To The Future 3" and it was just Cowboys and DeLoriens :joker:.

seems like the perfect time to rewatch this scene

I was 8 when that episode aired why are you so old and does it scare you.

you do know that posting old youtube clips is not the same as carbon dating

right?

I was just making a comparison... Plenty of people have done "red face" to depict Native Americans... and like I said, Native Americans are more likely to be shot in the USA by a policeman than any other race. I've brought up Native Americans before in discussions about race but they've not been picked up before.

Kids don't play cowboys and Indians... I get that, but they used to. Kizzy mentioned spaghetti westerns, I didn't... but Burt Lancaster, Johnny Depp, Audrey Hepburn, they've all done a "red face" without any comeback whatsoever. Red lives matter.

Don't know why I pointed all that at you, Niamh... it was for TS as well.

There were many cowboy and Indian films that depicted the Indians as the good guys. As a kid, I always wanted to be the Indian because, in my child mind, Indians were good, cowboys were bad.

As for actors, I agree with Smudgie... its acting. We could ask, should Dustin Hoffman of played an autistic man in 'Rain Man'? Should Daniel Day-Lewis of played a man with cerebral palsy in 'My Left Foot'? Should Francois Cluzet of played the part of a quadriplegic in 'The Untouchables'? All of these roles could have been played by someone who authentically has one of these conditions.

My brother and I also used to be eager to the the Indians as my Dad was fascinated with them and read a lot of stuff about their culture which he passed on to us. Agree with the rest of your post.

Same here. I wanted to be an Indian Chief. I remember getting an Indian costume for Xmas complete with a brilliant head dress (and a bow and arrow) and wearing it practically permanently for months. I even named my dog Apache. :hee:

Isn't he part Indian(as in Native American)?

@Livia and Jet

There is nothing more innocent than childhood and its interesting that we were all drawn towards wanting to enact the Native American Indian.

DR is that a little blackface going on in your avatar?

:suspect:

There is indeed but then I'm mixed race so I think I'm excused :hee: