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Post by lousingh on May 29, 2018 16:02:19 GMT
Addendum: I do try to take things in the spirit of the era. I can deal with the Indian doctor in Part One of "The Hand of Fear". Even my Latino friends can deal with Arturo Villar from "The War Games". I actually like the sorta-kinda respectful handling of different parts of the world in "Four to Doomsday."
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Post by Jaspal Cheema on May 29, 2018 22:06:06 GMT
My all time favourite Dr Who story of the whole 55 years so far is The Keys of Marinus. So I guess my answer is going to have to be - "No." I can hear this. We all have different ideas of what we like, regardless of quality, and that colours our ideas of what we want, etc. Here's an inverse example. The one classic DW I can't watch without wanting to throw a brick at my TV is ... "The Talons of Weng-Chiang." My Mom is Chinese. I can't get through half an episode without all the racist crap that was flung at Yoko Ono from when she hooked up with John Lennon ringing in my ears -- those terms were used for my Mom too. Every time I see "Coolie" in the end titles, I want to drop a cinder block on the DVD player. No matter how much I love Lightfoot and Jago, parts of it are so bigoted that it feels like Bill Maher and Donald Trump were script editors instead of Robert Holmes. I personally hold it in such low esteem that I would trade those 6 episodes for 1 episode each of "Marco Polo," "The Myth Makers", "The Massacre," "The Savages," "The Smugglers," and "Fury from the Deep." Heck, I would consider trading them for "Mission to the Unknown" and the 5 missing episodes of "The Space Pirates." But Lou,wouldn't Marco Polo have the same effect on you? As far as I can see from the recons and hearing the Chinese dialects on the soundtrack,the Chinese stereotypes in this serial are even more pronounced and accentuated.It almost resembles a panto in some scenes.
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Post by Patrick Coles on May 30, 2018 17:10:31 GMT
yeah and remember how English those two English teachers were in 'An Unearthly Child'
plus how utterly Welsh those Welsh miners were in 'The Green Death'
and how Scottish those Scots were in 'Terror of The Zygons' too
while those Daleks were so totally stereotypical as Skaro radiation drenched mutations !!!!
it's only a television programme...if it's that frightening or upsetting there is an off switch as Jon Pertwee once said
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Post by lousingh on May 30, 2018 19:58:20 GMT
I can hear this. We all have different ideas of what we like, regardless of quality, and that colours our ideas of what we want, etc. Here's an inverse example. The one classic DW I can't watch without wanting to throw a brick at my TV is ... "The Talons of Weng-Chiang." My Mom is Chinese. I can't get through half an episode without all the racist crap that was flung at Yoko Ono from when she hooked up with John Lennon ringing in my ears -- those terms were used for my Mom too. Every time I see "Coolie" in the end titles, I want to drop a cinder block on the DVD player. No matter how much I love Lightfoot and Jago, parts of it are so bigoted that it feels like Bill Maher and Donald Trump were script editors instead of Robert Holmes. I personally hold it in such low esteem that I would trade those 6 episodes for 1 episode each of "Marco Polo," "The Myth Makers", "The Massacre," "The Savages," "The Smugglers," and "Fury from the Deep." Heck, I would consider trading them for "Mission to the Unknown" and the 5 missing episodes of "The Space Pirates." But Lou,wouldn't Marco Polo have the same effect on you? As far as I can see from the recons and hearing the Chinese dialects on the soundtrack,the Chinese stereotypes in this serial are even more pronounced and accentuated.It almost resembles a panto in some scenes. It's not bad in the first few episodes. I absolutely would have problems with the later episodes.
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Post by lousingh on May 30, 2018 21:19:47 GMT
yeah and remember how English those two English teachers were in 'An Unearthly Child' plus how utterly Welsh those Welsh miners were in 'The Green Death' and how Scottish those Scots were in 'Terror of The Zygons' too while those Daleks were so totally stereotypical as Skaro radiation drenched mutations !!!! it's only a television programme...if it's that frightening or upsetting there is an off switch as Jon Pertwee once said First, I want this to be perfectly clear: I understand that I might be over-reacting. However, IMHO, these stereotypes very damaging. One stereotype here is exemplified by Rosanne's tweet that got here canned by ABC. I get to see the effects daily. Example: I went to a Party Political meeting three weeks ago for a memorial for my late father. It was interrupted by a newcomer who asked why a terrorist like him would be memorialised. Even after a local Congressman, old friends of his, etc. told him why; even after letters from various highly-regarded Conservatives from over the years were read aloud; even after he found out that my parents and I have been consulted by FIVE administrations on National Security issues (Carter, Reagan, Bush 41, Bush 43, and Obama) -- he still said that Dad, Mom, and I were lying in wait and biding my time -- and then he said reported us to the FBI. The local head of the FBI told me that he told this guy that my Dad and Mom have done more for the National Security of this country than his entire family combined and that I myself had done more than he could dream of. I presume he was the one who left the MAGA hat with feces in my breezeway that weekend. (I still don't know why Clinton didn't want anything and why Trump doesn't.) Having said that... In fact, I do turn the switch off. I don't own VTs, DVDs, etc., of "The Talons of Weng-Chiang", "The Green Death", and "Vengeance on Varos" (for starters) because of the stereotypes. People have offered to give them to me and I have declined them. The VTs that were given to me for my graduation included these stories; I taped over them. It's my way of protesting. It might mean nothing in overall scheme of things, but is important *to me* that I do so. ASIDE: I do not suggest censoring these stories. If this doesn't bother you, then by all means watch them and purchase them as you see fit until your heart is content. That's part of what freedom is all about. It's the same reason I would never own, say, "Song of the South" and others would. Similarly, I didn't take several Indian movies from friends for their stereotypical portrayal of the British overall. (For instance, I don't think all Britons tried to outdo each other as torturers and mass murderers in India.) I have the same standard for portrayals of Jews, Latinos, Africans, etc. Again, it means almost nothing to anyone else, but it is important *to me* to not give patronage to movies that treat Caucasians as uniformly boorish, malicious, dumb, or whatever. YMMV Big differences between what you so generously offered after such concentrated thought and what I apparently noted without regard or intellect: 1. Do you realise how INSULTING it is for you to conflate reality and fantasy to seemingly justify bigotry? 2. Do you *not* expect Scotsman (I am 1/16 Scottish) in Scotland, Welsh in Wales, or Britons in the United Kingdom? 3. FAR MORE IMPORTANTLY: Is there a Scottish, Welsh, or British equivalent of "Coolie" (person of Chinese decent is presumed to be unskilled or stupid) that was used explicitly in the stories you mentioned? If so, please point me to the episodes where they are used in the story or in the end titles. IMHO, this condescending attitude permeates the entire serial of "The Talons of Weng Chiang." Why is John Bennett portraying Li H'Sen Chang? All of the characters portrayed by actual Orientals are in bit parts, as if the production team thought they were lesser people. Why?
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Richard Develyn
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Living in hope that more missing episodes will come back to us.
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Post by Richard Develyn on May 31, 2018 8:46:48 GMT
w.r.t. Lough's points about stereotyping
Although someone will probably point out in a minute that we're straying well away from missing episode discussions, I would like to answer and I hope build on what you've just said because I think it's important.
(all imvho of course)
Stereotyping is one of the many forms of reductionism that we, as human beings, employ in order to make sense of the world, and to have some sort of framework of communication with our neighbours within which we can discuss the world.
Because of its use in communication stereotyping has strong cultural links. When people where I live talk about going to the Paki's for a newspaper, or the Chinky's or the Indian (I don't know why they don't say Indy's) for a meal, they are actually categorising a whole nation of people into corner shop owners or providers of fast or not-so-fast food. They all work hard, they'll say about them, but you'll never see a poor one and they all stick together and so on and so on.
Of course it's wrong, even bigoted though 99% of the time there's no malice in it, but it's natural, and I doubt I'll ever see an end of it in my lifetime.
Being wrong, it's also going to be damaging, but only in the way that all wrong-thinking is ultimately damaging.
The way to overcome this is to argue against it, to enlighten people, but only when you have a chance of saying something that's going to stick in people's minds. Right now where I live you find the majority of Pakistani, Chinese and Indian people working in those sorts of places. Start explaining to the locals about the wonderous culture and variety that all these nations have and they'll doubtlessly acknowledge the truth of what you're saying whilst at the same time continuing to think of them in terms of these stereotypes because that's all that they need to do in order to live their lives and communicate meaningfully with their neighbours.
On the internet, of course, you have a broader audience and more chance of finding people whose stereotyping needs are weaker, so it's worth working away at it by pointing out practical weaknesses in these simplifactions.
But not by arguing that stereotyping as a practice is a bad thing. No point in doing that - you'll never stop it. I would also resist the temptation of calling things offensive and insulting - that's using shaming techniques as a form of censorship. Censorship is counter-productive, all that happens is that people continue to hold their views but now you don't get to hear about it and therefore lose your chance to argue against it.
(Not much point self-censoring either, if you think about it - you need to know your enemy)
During the time of Talons, chinese people in london ran laundries, or were seen as glamorous villains or heroes like Dr Fu Man Chu and that Chinese detective whose name I forget. During the time that Talons was made stereotyping of chinese people was more to do with kung-fu and chinese restaurants. Talons is a perfectly legitimate piece of cultural television of the 70s and I find very little to justify an attack on that program per se. That would be quite different to someone holding those views now, of course, but attacking Talons and things like it wont help your case, and I am for you, BTW, not against you, but remember that asking people to think more about things is an uphill struggle so you need to choose your battles carefully because if people think you're over-reacting that'll give them a great excuse to stop listening to you.
Richard
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RWels
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Post by RWels on May 31, 2018 11:00:48 GMT
First, I want this to be perfectly clear: I understand that I might be over-reacting. However, IMHO, these stereotypes very damaging. One stereotype here is exemplified by Rosanne's tweet that got here canned by ABC. I get to see the effects daily. Stereotypes and racism are not the same thing at all. For one, I'd generally say that stereotypes often have a grain of truth, i.e. generally speaking Germans are kind of solidly organised, but lacking imagination and humor. In television terms, how about 'Allo 'Allo, 10 years of nothing but stereotypes. The homosexual dandy has been stereotyped since forever (or two centuries or so). The problem is that you're watching a series that isn't terribly original or groundbreaking, and generally falls back on stock characters, settings borrowed from other genres, etcetera. You'd be better off watching classical star trek. Addendum: I do try to take things in the spirit of the era. Not really sure you can say that if you tape over shows that were, in their own time/country/context, intended as innocent pieces of entertainment. I mean, you can't have it both ways. If for you they're ruined today by racist stereotypes, then that's that. OOI Have you ever considered how undermining it is that characters who wear glasses or are intelligent, are 99.9% relegated to being some kind of nerd/geek/social inept on the side line? (And doesn't that eventually have consequences too, when it comes to mistrusting facts and science and all that clever stuff?) Similar to what you did, I switched off the simpsons for that in the 1980s and I've never ever switched them back on again since.
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Post by Alan Jeffries on May 31, 2018 15:52:59 GMT
Such emotive issues, and valid comments. History is there to be learnt from. And today's society is more coherent, diverse and (mostly) tolerant of others. And that's what we have learnt. TV reflects the society of the time, so we must look at shows in their context. You only have to look at something like The Sweeney and shine todays values upon it and it looks bad, but at the time it was a reflection of society in the same way that Coronation Street did fourteen years previously. Onto John Bennet. I don't know the figures, but how many black/Asian/Indian actors were in Equity at the time? I would suspect not that many. And as these thins do, the old boys network would have been in play. And you have to remember that a lot of the people running things were born in the 30's or 40's when attitudes were a lot more hardened. Thankfully these things are being consigned to history. So the use of the term Coolie in Talons is actually accurate in the context of the story setting. It's all about context.
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Post by lousingh on May 31, 2018 16:10:18 GMT
Thanks for all the responses. I am glad to have some extra context. I think I will give the story a whirl in the next few weeks to see if I can control my anger -- particularly when Greel insults the Chinese men that Li H'Sen Chang employs.
The notes on context are why I think it should be out there for others to watch if they want to. I have the same feeling for the banned Warner Brother cartoons - and I loved some of those as a kid. (They make me literally sick to my stomach.) You probably feel the same way about stories like "The Talons of Weng-Chiang".
BTW, when it comes to the portrayal of "nerds", well, let's just say my wife was very upset that I throw up when certain episodes of "The Big Bang Theory" are broadcast and then become reclusive and surly for hours. It is very disconcerting to see things I do to make me a more effective employee played for ridicule on national television. I get flashbacks to the teachers helping the bigger kids beat me up when I was in kindergarten for being the first non-Caucasian in the area. (It is PTSD.)
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Post by richardwoods on May 31, 2018 18:12:43 GMT
For me, the biggest & most serious problem with Talons was the bloody rat, nuff said! 😉
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Post by Greg H on May 31, 2018 19:14:17 GMT
Ah, the rat! Happy days That was one mean glove puppet Should have got its own spin off show really.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on May 31, 2018 19:47:54 GMT
Ah, the rat! Happy days That was one mean glove puppet Should have got its own spin off show really. It wasn't a glove puppet. It was a pantomime rat with some poor sod inside.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on May 31, 2018 20:20:56 GMT
My all time favourite Dr Who story of the whole 55 years so far is The Keys of Marinus. So I guess my answer is going to have to be - "No." I can hear this. We all have different ideas of what we like, regardless of quality, and that colours our ideas of what we want, etc. Here's an inverse example. The one classic DW I can't watch without wanting to throw a brick at my TV is ... "The Talons of Weng-Chiang." My Mom is Chinese. I can't get through half an episode without all the racist crap that was flung at Yoko Ono from when she hooked up with John Lennon ringing in my ears -- those terms were used for my Mom too. Every time I see "Coolie" in the end titles, I want to drop a cinder block on the DVD player. No matter how much I love Lightfoot and Jago, parts of it are so bigoted that it feels like Bill Maher and Donald Trump were script editors instead of Robert Holmes. I personally hold it in such low esteem that I would trade those 6 episodes for 1 episode each of "Marco Polo," "The Myth Makers", "The Massacre," "The Savages," "The Smugglers," and "Fury from the Deep." Heck, I would consider trading them for "Mission to the Unknown" and the 5 missing episodes of "The Space Pirates." There was a lot of negative stereotyping in television in general around 1977/8. Take for example The New Avengers Trap episode. It was, sadly, how it was back then. Doctor Who can't be singled out there, in the same way it gets singled out for wobbly sets. Let's not forget that there were a lot of positive representations at the time in many shows, including Doctor Who, and I think chiefly of Earl Cameron's astronaut role in The Tenth Planet. The problem with today's series is, that like Talons, it draws too much attention to the colour of someone's skin, rather than allowing the characters to just get on with it. I don't want to walk into a room and have someone say to me, "Oh my god, you're white, that's so great! Now will you please take this item along to the next department." So while we have the great positive character of Bill, which the series has been needing for a long time, we then have unnecessary mentions of the colour of skin in episodes like Thin Ice and Oxygen which seem for me to be a backward step. We are now living in a multi-cultural country where our capital boasts over 300 different spoken languages. But how is that more important than who we are as equal people, living together and getting on with life? Why do we need to even mention race or colour of skin to begin with? In Doctor Who, take a moment to contrast the mentions of the colour of one's skin in Series 10 with the Williams role in The Tenth Planet. You don't have Polly saying, "Oh my God, Doctor, they actually have black astronauts in the future? This is like, so rad!" Williams character just gets on with the significant role is has, in a quiet, dignified way. In this respect, I really think Morgan Freeman was right in his stance regarding Black History Month, and the reasons for his non-support of it.
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RWels
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Post by RWels on May 31, 2018 21:54:57 GMT
I can hear this. We all have different ideas of what we like, regardless of quality, and that colours our ideas of what we want, etc. Here's an inverse example. The one classic DW I can't watch without wanting to throw a brick at my TV is ... "The Talons of Weng-Chiang." My Mom is Chinese. I can't get through half an episode without all the racist crap that was flung at Yoko Ono from when she hooked up with John Lennon ringing in my ears -- those terms were used for my Mom too. Every time I see "Coolie" in the end titles, I want to drop a cinder block on the DVD player. No matter how much I love Lightfoot and Jago, parts of it are so bigoted that it feels like Bill Maher and Donald Trump were script editors instead of Robert Holmes. I personally hold it in such low esteem that I would trade those 6 episodes for 1 episode each of "Marco Polo," "The Myth Makers", "The Massacre," "The Savages," "The Smugglers," and "Fury from the Deep." Heck, I would consider trading them for "Mission to the Unknown" and the 5 missing episodes of "The Space Pirates." There was a lot of negative stereotyping in television in general around 1977/8. Not to mention, they still had the B & W Minstrel Show at that time. (Although the blackface element had apparently been reduced by then, or so WP says anyway.)
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Post by Greg H on May 31, 2018 22:42:20 GMT
I really think Morgan Freeman was right in his stance regarding Black History Month, and the reasons for his non-support of it. In an ideal world - yes, I would agree. In this world, as it stands, the history curriculum that is specified for delivery in UK schools doesn't have much to say about pre colonial African civilisations with the exception of Ancient Egypt, and you don't really get much of a mention that Ancient Egypt was an African civilisation and the strong evidence, as presented by prof. Cheikh Anta Diop et al, that this ancient African civilisation was populated by Black Africans. No mention of the Songhai empire, the Swahili confederation etc. In fact Africa is nearly always painted as a culturally impoverished and generally backwards continent that Europeans somehow brought culture to, which couldn't really be further from the truth as Africa had sciences and arts when the evidence suggests most of Europe was still on stone axes. It would be lovely if we lived in an era where history was taught in a factual and balanced way, the crimes of the empire included; as it stands though, black history month is usually the only opportunity for other voices to be heard. On the topic of the stereotypes portrayed in Talons, they are a little uncomfortable to my eyes. It was only a few years after Talons that the series 'The Chinese detective' was made which was comparatively speaking, light years ahead in its attitude and treatment of minority groups. I still like the giant sewer rat though
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