A Discussion of Satire

For anyone who doesn't know, the Colbert report posted a satirical tweet. In case you haven't seen it,here's a screencap(he has deleted it)

This tweet inspired a lot of strong feelings,both pro and against. For me,i believe Colbert was trying to make fun of Snyder for his ridiculous defense of using the "redskin" name, and not intentionally trying to hurt Asian-Americans. To me this was a well intentioned attempt at satire that came out wrong.

The main reason is because of the power dynamics. As a straight white dude, you are pretty much at the top of the totem pole in America,while Asian Americans are less so. Hence its very hard for the former to make jokes about the latter that don't come off oppressive,even if that isn't the intent.

To expand on that,i think its possible to be a perfectly good person and make mistakes,because we're human. Sometimes we don't know realize how our words/actions come off. To illustrate, there was a time i said something offensive to a Asian friend without realizing. When i was informed of how i fucked up, i apologized to said friend and we still keep in contact.

So to me, that experience taught me 2 things. First is that generally when a marginalized group are telling your actions were problematic,its better to just listen and apologize. Sure some may continue to hold a grudge,but i feel most will probably forgive if they get a genuine apology. Secondly, it instilled in me a belief that society as a whole would make a lot more progress on various ism issues if we learned to listen to criticism instead of dismissing it.

Related to that,i think we need to have real discussion about who gets to claim benefit of the doubt/satire when jokes go wrong.  I think we all remember the backlash MHP got(and still received even after apologizing), and recently another prominent black woman got attacked on twitter for satirizing herself. So i do think more marginalized groups don't seem to get that same benefit of the doubt when it comes to comedy which is a problem. This kinda relates to my main point,which is the context of who has more power is the main issue here.

Also, the creator of the #CancelColbert hashtag who happens to be a Asian Women has gotten rape/death threats over this,along with people ridiculing her name. So there is a issue of how people who say they aren't racist will sink down to that level if a POC says something they don't like.

Vines i can't stand

Im a semi-regular viewer of Worldstarhiphop, and of vines/trending videos in general. I can generally find enjoyment out of them,but there are a few types i have no interest in watching. I've seen all these types in Vine compilations regularly,so they don't seem to be isolated incidents.

Punishment porn- These are the videos where parents harshly discipline there children,and put it on the internet for all the world to see. There are a few reasons why these upset me

To give a little background,growing up when it came to discipline my mom was the harsher one when it came to that. The one time my dad was legit angry with me he didn't need to use spanking or anything to show that. Now I've seen a lot of people seem to express a nostalgia for that type of discipline,and believe it made them into a better person.

I don't agree with that. Whether or not i felt guilty about my actions had nothing to do with the punishment i received. In the example with my dad,even though there as no psychical punishment i felt guilty as hell about what i did(For anyone wondering,what happened was that basically i asked one of my aunts to give me a ride home from school. Ended up getting a ride from a friend,and forgot to tell said Aunt).

But i realize different people have differing opinions on that. However,even if you think that kind of punishment is justified,why record it for the internet to see?Like what is making your child's punishment a spectacle for strangers to watch supposed to teach?

And one thing i've noticed is that a lot of these videos seem to be black girls getting punished for acting like a "ho". Just to be clear i don't want anyone's punishment used for entertainment like this, but this brings up a whole other set of issues.

Smackcam/Yaga-Im not sure how this idea started,but there seems to be this pervasive idea that if you film yourself assaulting someone,somehow that is supposed to make it comedy. At the very least with Jackass and its imitators you got the sense they are having fun with it,or trying to. But i've seen people randomly smack fast food workers(because really,the life of a fast food worker isn't miserable enough apparently), and some pretty vicious hair pulling(Who's victims seem to be elusively black women),and i have no idea why i should see it as anything but physical assault.

Swearing kids-All i see here are parents using there kids as props for internet fame. Either the kid has issues the parents are exploiting,or they are coaching the kids into saying those things. Both of which repulse me. Also, videos where parents make there kids cry on purpose are a no-no for me too. Honestly, 90% of vines involving kids are not something i want to see. I don't mind adorable videos of kids doing adorable things,but most vines involving kids don't fall into that category.

For anyone curious about why i focused on black women at certain points in this post,its because of things like black women being more likely to suffer,and die from domestic violence. And considering a lot of the violent vines seem targeted towards black woman/girls(just right now im seeing people tweet about a vine involving violence against a BW, and worse apparently it happens with a group of BM standing by and doing nothing)), it brings up unfortunate implications.But in general i've just gotten tired of people using vines as a excuse to be violent,or recording violent acts instead of actually trying to stop it.