Posted October 23, 2012
Sogi-Ya: I usually just read threads, but I thought your views were worth replying to. You don't have to like the show, but please try to be fair. Consider the following.
Regarding Badger: Would you please inform me which ethnic groups are permitted to have mobsters? A mobster has to come from somewhere.
Regarding Jubal Early (who is named after a Confederate military leader--so much for glorifying the South): must black actors only be cast in special "black" roles, or can they play anyone--good, bad, or indifferent? Firefly has both white and black actors in both good and bad roles--Shepherd Book and Jubal Early, Atherton Wing and Malcolm Reynolds (well, he's all right), and so forth.
Regarding the Reavers: I grant that they are an obvious stand-in for the "indian savages" of many old Westerns. But look at what they actually are. They are people driven insane by government experiments. This allows them to serve the powerful narrative role of the scary unknown in the wild, while providing a legitimate basis for showing them behaving in inhuman ways. Just because the show copied a narrative role that was racist in its origins doesn't mean all possible beings placed in that role are racist stereotypes.
Regarding Niska and Jewish stereotypes: you may have a point. I didn't think of him as Jewish, but I also have been fortunate enough to mostly avoid encountering negative Jewish stereotypes in my life.
Regarding Badger: Would you please inform me which ethnic groups are permitted to have mobsters? A mobster has to come from somewhere.
Regarding Jubal Early (who is named after a Confederate military leader--so much for glorifying the South): must black actors only be cast in special "black" roles, or can they play anyone--good, bad, or indifferent? Firefly has both white and black actors in both good and bad roles--Shepherd Book and Jubal Early, Atherton Wing and Malcolm Reynolds (well, he's all right), and so forth.
Regarding the Reavers: I grant that they are an obvious stand-in for the "indian savages" of many old Westerns. But look at what they actually are. They are people driven insane by government experiments. This allows them to serve the powerful narrative role of the scary unknown in the wild, while providing a legitimate basis for showing them behaving in inhuman ways. Just because the show copied a narrative role that was racist in its origins doesn't mean all possible beings placed in that role are racist stereotypes.
Regarding Niska and Jewish stereotypes: you may have a point. I didn't think of him as Jewish, but I also have been fortunate enough to mostly avoid encountering negative Jewish stereotypes in my life.
