Wednesday, April 6, 2011
Cartoons and race in America
Well, I love Bugs Bunny. I didn't really notice anything racist about it to be honest. But then I watched it again and found a few things. I mean, I guess you wouldn't really know what to look for unless you were looking for it, like racism in Bugs Bunny of all things, you would have to know its there to be able to spot it. I can see Elmer Fudd taking on the role of the white man, while Bugs Bunny plays the act of being the black man, or a trickster. That means if Bugs Bunny is a trickster, then I also think that Elmer Fudd could be the the black in the cartoon also then, and Bugs Bunny would be the white man using his intelligence and wit to outsmart dumb ol' Elmer. I think the racism manifests itself into this cartoon by very casually portraying Elmer Fudd as an idiot, which at the time, was society's take on blacks. Bugs Bunny is always 4 or 5 steps ahead of Elmer Fudd and I think this in my mind is what makes him white, or even a trickster. I think Bugs Bunny is taking on the role of the white man because again, during this period in society, no one ever heard of a black man being 4 or 5 steps ahead of a white man in...in anything. I think it would be really interesting to watch more Bugs Bunny cartoons, and now that I know what to look for, to try and see how many of these racial messages were implanted into each cartoon, because I honestly had no idea they were even there until I read the blog prompt and read a little bit of chapter 9.
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I think that in modern day society, there are no more tricksters in cartoons anymore. They now reside in the reality tv shows, like prison break. If you are unfamiliar with the show prison break, it is about an engineer whose brother is wrongfully accused for murder and is sentenced to death row in prison. Micheal Skofield robs a bank to purposely get into the same prison as his brother, and then works to break him out. Micheal is the brains of this entire operation and uses his wit, talent, knowledge, word play, guile, and speech craft to work the system and to ultimately get him and his brother out of prison and to safety. Any other person would have resorted to rallying fellow cell mates and using brute force to break out. Micheal tricks the guards, rises in the rank among prison inmates and does not even have to lift a single hand of violence. Like I said, the trickster figure is dead among cartoons but is alive and well in other shows. Prison break is just one example. there are many others like the apprentice, lost, heroes, jerico, x-files, lie to me, etc...
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