Re: What It Takes For White People To Notice Racism

1

Well, more could be said about the Rose-n-Mickey stuff, but to quote someone else I can't mention, Spoilers!


Posted by: oudemia | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 5:27 AM
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It's years old by now, and I don't actually give a damn about spoilers (and I think I've seen everything with Rose in it by now). I'm not remembering race being an issue in terms of their relationship (although there was a fair amount of treating Mickey as a hapless idiot that had me slightly puzzled between racist, or if some character's going to be the idiot, why shouldn't it be the black guy. I could be talked into either reading.)

What were you thinking of? (There's going to be something blindingly obvious that I overlooked or forgot, I'm sure. I was probably crocheting something tricky.)


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 5:36 AM
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Well, I was thinking that he gets put aside as unsuitable (for not being awesome) rather quickly, and when he does end up with "the right person" that person is also black.
I've noticed on cheezy tv shows where characters "date" a lot that the (temporary) boyfriends and girlfriends will be of all races and colors and nothing is made of it. But that is different from a steady and recurring love interest.


Posted by: oudemia | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 5:40 AM
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Either I missed him ending up with someone, or it hasn't happened yet in the bits I've seen.

Fair enough on their not staying together, but I think it still wouldn't have happened on US television without being more of a thing: he was a long-term relationship in the past if not in showtime, and a long-term character, rather than a one-off date like you're talking about.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 5:46 AM
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Lost had a black/white couple.


Posted by: CharleyCarp | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 5:48 AM
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which isn't so much a special issue for interracial families

I know you're right about this, but there's also something really depressing when people are talking shit about your family. I might be overthinking this, though, as all the pushback we've gotten has been extremely mild given our family makeup.


Posted by: Thorn | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 5:49 AM
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Like, taboo isn't the right word, exactly, it's not as if you never see interracial dating/marriage in scripted TV or movies. But it's still very very unlikely to see an extended black/white romantic relationship that's not treated as an issue.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 5:49 AM
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5: Damn. I really am way out of date on TV, to the point where I shouldn't be generalizing. Did it fit anything I'm talking about, or am I just wrong?


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 5:52 AM
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I don't think that Mickey's race is an issue at all in Dr Who. Many of the same character tropes have been played out in the current couple of series, too. They just need a way to handle the relationship between the Dr and his assistant, and having a gormless boyfriend around is a useful dramatic tool. I think British TV may well be quite different from US TV in some respects, and this might be one of them. Think even, of the various relationships in something like Luther.

However, I probably don't watch enough US TV to really make a generalisation.


Posted by: nattarGcM ttaM | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 5:55 AM
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10

I don't watch much at all -- but was thinking about House too. But I see it wasn't uncomplicated.


Posted by: CharleyCarp | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 5:58 AM
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I read something long ago (mid 90s, I guess) about the progression that minorities go through in popular culture. First they're objects of ridicule; then they're there to educate white people; lastly they get to be people. The thesis of whatever it was that I read was that Homicide was the first show on television where blacks folks were folks. (I would say that queer folks seem to be edging out of the educational period now.)
So, perhaps unsurprisingly, The Wire had an interracial couple whose relationship was fraught for 99 reasons, but race wasn't one. (That I'm remembering?)


Posted by: oudemia | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:00 AM
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Damn, and I'm drawing a blank on that too. Was it in season 5? I never got to season 5.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:02 AM
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10: Right. But on the show it wasn't a thing.


Posted by: oudemia | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:02 AM
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I really shouldn't be blogging about TV. People who watch TV more attentively should comment about these issues, ignoring whatever I said.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:03 AM
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I'm still totally right about the casting in Hitch, though.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:05 AM
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12: I thought it started in 4? But maybe not til 5. I'm thinking of Daniels and Pearlman. And it's quite possible that Daniels wife (soon to be ex) makes some kind of comment, but I really don't remember.


Posted by: oudemia | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:05 AM
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In Bones, reference was made to a prior relationship between the Boreanaz character and Tamara Taylor character, but they didn't show anything, except maybe some romantic tension.


Posted by: CharleyCarp | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:07 AM
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Oh, you're right, I'd forgotten that. Fair enough, and that meets my standards of 'not treated as a thing', which is why I forgot it. Could be I'm just totally wrong here.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:07 AM
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Gawker agreed precisely with your assessment of poor old Eva Mendes' instrumentality:

Finding a love interest for Will Smith in Hitch wasn't easy: Go black, and the Euro's won't buy tickets; go white, and red staters would burn down the multiplex or propose some kind of constitutional amendment. Apparently, Eva Mendes was exactly the right shade, since the constitution seems to be relatively intact.


Posted by: Flippanter | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:09 AM
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13 -- That's what brought it to mind. From the linked story, though, you can imagine why advertisers might not be eager to associate with some story lines.


Posted by: CharleyCarp | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:09 AM
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17: Saying Boreanaz reminds me of the Fred/Gunn relationship in Angel, but that was definitely a racialized thing -- the show treated it as an issue.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:10 AM
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Grey's Anatomy does all sorts of interracial romances, right? I don't watch. I'm also going to say this without evidence to back me up, but it seems like a lot of shows for black audiences (Single Ladies springs to mind but I want to say there are more beyond the Tyler Perrysphere) are much more likely to include black-white relationships than are shows geared toward white audiences. I don't watch enough of anything to be sure this is true, though, but it's felt that way in the past.


Posted by: Thorn | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:12 AM
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I'm going to stop generalizing now, because I really don't know enough about TV broadly, but 22 last sounds right to me.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:14 AM
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5, 8 - I don't remember race being an issue in the Rose & Bernard (have I got the names right?) relationship, but I do remember being surprised when this white bloke turned out to be the husband she was looking for and worrying about. What a racist.

Apart from this marriage, my longest relationship was with an Indian boy (London born and bred), and the only people who ever seemed to have a problem with it were his family.


Posted by: asilon | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:15 AM
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14: No, you're not wrong, really. Any drama is going to discuss it, if it's a longterm relationship, because it would be unrealistic not to -- but I do think most shows have moved past OMG MY INTERRACIAL RELATIONSHIP -- CAN YOU BELIEVE IT?!
The whole "black male actor with v. light-skinned black or hispanic love interest" thing seems super complicated in lots of ways -- but one of them is certainly producers worrying about having too many black people in a movie they want to sell to white people.


Posted by: oudemia | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:16 AM
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Mixed marriages/relationships do not surprise me (because I am a paragon of enlightenment and Bill-Clinton-at-his-imaginary-best postracial generosity as well as athletic grace, ladies... the parents of my best friend in grade/middle school were black and white, so I was too young to learn not to think it ordinary), but the Ex used to mention how often movies and television show people of different races as close, longtime friends and how sadly rare that sort of friendship is in real life.


Posted by: Flippanter | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:23 AM
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27

Does Italian still count as a race?


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:25 AM
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7

Like, taboo isn't the right word, exactly, it's not as if you never see interracial dating/marriage in scripted TV or movies. But it's still very very unlikely to see an extended black/white romantic relationship that's not treated as an issue.

I'm not sure exactly what your complaint is. Take "Something Different" (a romantic comedy about an interracial couple). Being a romantic comedy there are jokes and the couple has to overcome issues. Do you not want these jokes and issues to involve race at all? That seems a little silly.


Posted by: James B. Shearer | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:26 AM
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I don't watch nearly enough TV to effectively comment on this. There are no mixed race couples on Mythbusters.


Posted by: Sifu Tweety | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:30 AM
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30

This isn't about interracial relationships but: the new TV show The New Girl swapped out one black roommate in the pilot for a different one in the other episodes without attempting to explain, as far as I noticed. Did they think the audience really won't notice? That everyone just sees "token black guy"? (Also: the show seems to be not very good.)


Posted by: essear | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:30 AM
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31

What I want to know is why would someone who "doesn't get out to the movies very often" choose to go to see Hitch?


Posted by: urple | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:32 AM
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Interracial romances in film in the 1990s that weren't treated as a Thing or even discussed in racial terms:

Lenny and Mace in Strange Days. Jackie and Max in Jackie Brown, and, for that matter, Marcellus and Mia Wallace in Pulp Fiction.


Posted by: ajay | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:33 AM
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the new TV show The New Girl swapped out one black roommate in the pilot for a different one in the other episodes without attempting to explain

On Nick Jr., The Fresh Beat Band just switched red-haired white girls like they were supporting actors on Betwitched.


Posted by: | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:34 AM
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33 was me.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:34 AM
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30: Sure, but her being on a successful sitcom materially increases the probability that I will one day read the headline "Zooey Deschanel Kills a Guy in Drug-Fueled Blackout after Emmy Party, Screams 'I wear blue contact lenses!'."


Posted by: Flippanter | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:36 AM
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I've noticed on cheezy tv shows where characters "date" a lot that the (temporary) boyfriends and girlfriends will be of all races and colors and nothing is made of it.

Friends, for instance.

Will Smith in Hancock had a complicated relationship with Charlize Theron in which race wasn't really a factor in the present day.


Posted by: politicalfootball | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:38 AM
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I think Ally McBeal dated a black man. Looking at the internet to see if I remembered right, I am reminded of the president's daughter's relationship in West Wing. A thing because of people in the country not ready for it not to be a thing, but not really a thing in itself.


Posted by: CharleyCarp | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:38 AM
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38

Of course, in Hancock, the romance wasn't really a factor in the present day, either, so that's probably not a great example.


Posted by: politicalfootball | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:38 AM
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39

35: Be the change you want to see in the world.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:39 AM
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I think what's happening in the US is something we've had forever in these parts: as society becomes increasingly mixed racial lines blur, although they do not dissapear, and the degree of difference in racial features that is required to qualify a couple as 'interracial' increases.

That is, in this neck of the woods (DR), you can find any number of mostly-white women/men and mostly black men-women and that is regarded as completely normal. However, you'll very seldom find a completely white man/woman dating a completely black woman/man unless one of the two is a foreigner (most commonly a 60-plus italian man/woman with a black woman/man half that age).


Posted by: John Stapleton | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:42 AM
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I do remember being surprised when this white bloke turned out to be the husband she was looking for and worrying about.
Yeah, Rose&Bernard was only treated as a thing in that the writers set it up specifically to surprise the audience. I thought it was cleverly done.


Posted by: Eggplant | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:43 AM
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Not pertinent to anything much, but there are a lot more commercials featuring interracial families or families that can read as interracial, but I think they almost always steer clear of black dad/white mom.


Posted by: Thorn | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:44 AM
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Leverage, to my eye, tries very hard to make Hardison not just, "the black guy" without making him too "post-racial." His relationship with Parker has many complications but the fact that it's interracial isn't one of them.


Posted by: NickS | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:44 AM
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39: I'm not going to drug and arm Zooey Deschanel, Moby.


Posted by: Flippanter | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:46 AM
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45

She already has guns.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:47 AM
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46

I'm not going to drug an armed Zooey Deschanel, Moby.


Posted by: Flippanter | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:48 AM
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47

Good point. That does sound dangerous.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:49 AM
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48

you should drug her first and arm her afterwards, duh. it's like you don't understand women at all.


Posted by: alameida | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:54 AM
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To go back a little further, Redford's responses to people making a deal of it in Jeremiah Johnson was surely meant to instruct/validate viewers.

I think I read somewhere that Delle Bolton is of Italian extraction, so there's that Moby.


Posted by: CharleyCarp | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:57 AM
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The Fresh Beat Band just switched red-haired white girls

I just noticed that! Wikipedia says: "In Mid June-July of 2011, it was announced that Rose was leaving the show to get married and pursue other projects. She has been replaced by Tara Perry. Shayna has currently joined the all girl comedy skit site, Miss Funny."

Her blog there, however, has only one post, from April, and doesn't even try to be funny.


Posted by: apostropher | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 6:58 AM
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it's like you don't understand women at all.

That's preposterous. In fact, I've done so well at managing my personal life to the utmost in satisfaction that I'm considering offering consulting and advisory services to share my good fortune. [Sobs, punches self.]


Posted by: Flippanter | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:00 AM
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There are no mixed race couples on Mythbusters.
Grant and his robot.


Posted by: Eggplant | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:00 AM
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Any gun belonging to Zooey Deschanel would clearly shoot glitter or raspberry jam.


Posted by: oudemia | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:02 AM
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21
17: Saying Boreanaz reminds me of the Fred/Gunn relationship in Angel, but that was definitely a racialized thing -- the show treated it as an issue.

Wait, what? When? There was a love triangle, and true, she wound up with the white guy in the end, but I don't remember anyone saying that's why or characters on the show expressing disapproval when she was with Gunn or whatever.

And I agree with 3 that it's unfortunate at best who Mickey got paired with, especially considering how out of the blue it was. Definitely like how Moffat is handling relationships better than Davies did.


Posted by: Cyrus | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:02 AM
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Making it certain that the wound will get a horrible infection.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:03 AM
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55 to 53.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:03 AM
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Any gun belonging to Zooey Deschanel would clearly shoot glitter or raspberry jam.

Ironic, cubic zirconia?


Posted by: Flippanter | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:06 AM
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hey, flippanter, ixnay on the unching-pay. the lurkers were very clear in their support for me on this position, in email. in exchange, I won't bite my cuticles until they bleed, deal?


Posted by: alameida | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:08 AM
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Definitely like how Moffat is handling relationships better than Davies did.

Really? Or do you just mean having the companion stay with the gormless boyfriend rather than falling for the Doctor?


Posted by: emdash | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:11 AM
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I think zooey deschanel should be armed with a pearl-handled snub-nosed .38 from the early 1950s. so cute!!! and it fits in your whimsical clutch.

n.b. I have many whimsical vintage clutches so it's not a bad thing per se. wait, neither are cute vintage .38s? OK this whole plan is great. I will sign on to be similarly armed.


Posted by: alameida | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:11 AM
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I suspect Angelina Jolie is the only American actress these days who could pull off the tiny-automatic-in-the-stocking-top look.


Posted by: Flippanter | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:14 AM
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3, 54 - I'm getting a bit confused now. It's good for black/white couples to be shown, but bad if people actually end up with other people roughly the same colour as them? I don't get why the Mickey-Martha thing is unfortunate? They're both heroic resistance fighters or whatever, seems okay to me.

As for Moffat's relationships ... when are Rory and the Doctor going to get together????


Posted by: asilon | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:19 AM
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59 - gormless boyfriend? Careful my 14 year old doesn't hear you say such things.


Posted by: asilon | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:20 AM
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My vast knowledge of TV finally comes in handy:

Parenthood has an interracial couple, but they broke up. Also Joy Bryant is pretty fair skinned.

Community is definitely teasing a possible relationship b/w Britta and Troy.

The Office -- Stanley's wife is white.

Grey's Anatomy -- Avery and Lexie

Private Practice -- don't watch but according to the previews Kate Walsh and Taye Diggs have a thing

House

Leverage

HIMYM -- just last night, Ted had a date with a (fair skinned) black girl. And Robin is dating Kal Penn.

Rescue Me -- Black Shawn married Dennis Leary's character's daughter, but this was definitely treated as an issue. Mostly for laughs.

Happy Endings -- the Damon Wayans, Jr. character is married to a white woman.


Posted by: Josiah Bartlett | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:22 AM
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59: I definitely dig the companion not mooning over the doctor. The Martha stuff was painful. This time, Amy tried to tackle him in her pre-wedding jitters phase (perfectly reasonable) and has gotten over it. ("Gotten over it" as in not fucking mooning over him. Ugh!)


Posted by: oudemia | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:22 AM
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Community is definitely teasing a possible relationship b/w Britta Abed and Troy.


Posted by: essear | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:23 AM
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Poking around on the webs, I'd say there's a non-trivial chance that the casting director on New Girl is the daughter of Redford's "Salish" wife: if so, she's not Italian.

I should get to work.


Posted by: CharleyCarp | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:23 AM
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So, is Doctor Who something I should maybe watch? Mostly, my attention span is too limited to watch shows that take that long but I suppose I could try if I got an iPad so I didn't have to give the TV my full attention.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:24 AM
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There are lots of interracial couples. The bigger problem is:

If they'd cast him opposite a black woman, they'd lose the white moviegoing audience because it would have been a black romantic comedy,

so there are barely any mainstream black couples on TV.


Posted by: heebie-geebie | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:26 AM
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This isn't about interracial relationships but: the new TV show The New Girl swapped out one black roommate in the pilot for a different one in the other episodes without attempting to explain, as far as I noticed. Did they think the audience really won't notice? That everyone just sees "token black guy"? (Also: the show seems to be not very good.)

This happens a lot, because the pilot episode often gets shot months before they start making other episodes. Back in the 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s this and other continuity problems didn't matter because we didn't have instant access to all the episodes to prove that it was a continuity problem.

In this case the one black guy had to return to an earlier commitment to a show that he had assumed would be cancelled, but turned out not to be ("Happy Endings").


Posted by: Cryptic ned | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:26 AM
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61: There's a pair of tights I covet that have a drawing of a garter-n-revolver on the upper thigh. But they're one-size-fits-all and as a shortie shortie, this means I'd be constantly hiking them up to my tits. BAH.


Posted by: oudemia | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:27 AM
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My favorite relationship on television is that of the Monarch and Dr. Mrs. The Monarch.


Posted by: Flippanter | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:30 AM
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At that point, you may as well just keep your gun in a standard shoulder holster.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:30 AM
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Why is 64 TV-presidential?


Posted by: Mr. Blandings | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:32 AM
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there are barely any mainstream black couples on TV

What about the Cosbys? The Winslows?


Posted by: urple | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:33 AM
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73: Are shoulder holsters, or is drawing from a shoulder holster, compatible with the female form?


Posted by: Flippanter | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:34 AM
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I would like to make reference to a prior relationship between my character and Tamara Taylor's character, IYKWIM, AITYD.


Posted by: Walt Someguy | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:34 AM
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63: Rory is delightful, but, come on.


Posted by: emdash | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:37 AM
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I feel conflicted about the new Doctor Who (of which I haven't seen that much). What I liked about the old Doctor Who is that it was mostly devoid of interpersonal stuff. It was a) the Doctor, and b) random person from Earth travel through time! And fight evil! I liked it that the Doctor was just this weird guy who saved the world as a kind of hobby, rather than a chick-magnet.


Posted by: Walt Someguy | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:41 AM
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I cannot offer much useful to this thread.

But I have some random thoughts.
I like She and him.

I dont think women can really rock a shoulder holster, but a shotgun slung over the back with a badass knife strapped to your hip works.

A white friend has a four year old son whose father is black. He has the most amazing hair and is adorable. Seriously, everyone should have mixed race kids. (heck, all four year olds are adorable, I guess.)


Posted by: will | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:44 AM
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I liked it that the Doctor was just this weird guy who saved the world as a kind of hobby, rather than a chick-magnet.

Maybe that's just because the new Doctors have all been smoking hot instead of hilariously goofy?


Posted by: emdash | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:45 AM
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To clarify, I'm not calling treating interracial dating/marriage as a 'thing' a problem on TV -- if it's fraught in real life, it should be fraught on TV. I was pointing at TV as evidence that it still seems to be surprisingly fraught in real life ('surprisingly' compared to the percentage of people who say they don't have a problem with it.)

(The Hitch thing, I think is racist if I'm right about the thinking -- 'we don't want to either show a black/white relationship or have too many black people on screen' is just wrong. But that's different.)

(And I have no excuse for having gone to see Hitch, except that the few movies we see tend to be last minute unplanned. We had an evening, and it was showing someplace convenient.)


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:46 AM
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81: The first new Doctor? Rowr. The second leaves me cold, and I haven't seen any episodes with the third.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:48 AM
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81: I dunno, man. When I see Pertwee, I think, "Oooh, I'd like some of that!"*

*Not really.


Posted by: oudemia | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:49 AM
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82:

The Q tip dance is a popular dance in our house.


Posted by: will | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:49 AM
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68: If you have a high tolerance for idiotic, I think it's great. I got Newt watching it, though, and it does get embarrassing explaining to a ten year old that no, you're not failing to understand how that makes sense, it just doesn't make sense. It's not supposed to make sense, all right! It just isn't.

Sally is far too mature for anything so foolish.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:50 AM
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Hey, anyone seen Chris Y around recently?


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 8:12 AM
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LB, you and I are on the same TV trajectory, apparently, because I noticed the exact same thing when I started watching Dr. Who this year. It's not just Rose and Mickey, but there are many interracial couples, and it's just not a Thing the way it would be here. I watch some of the scenes and think, "Are there really this many black people in London?" (Yes, I know: Racist. And while I'm at it: Where are all the Indian people? Last I was in London, there were lots.) It's also that the white-black population distribution seems more 50-50 than 80-20, that's part of what catches my eye about it.

I also recommend watching Misfits, on Hulu, if you enjoy Dr. Who. These are the two shows upon which I formed my British TV opinion, and the inter-racial relationship angle holds true.


Posted by: wrenae | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 8:15 AM
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87:

Chris Y mentioned going to France last week.


Posted by: will | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 8:16 AM
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I heard there's a tunnel now.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 8:20 AM
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Misfits is great. Though my favorite recent british TV show is Downton Abbey. (I also loved the first episode, though not the next two, of the recent Sherlock Holmes mini-series, and I have a serious weakness for Law&Order:UK though I'm not going to argue it's actually good.)


Posted by: Unfoggetarian: "Pause endlessly, then go in" (9) | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 8:20 AM
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89: Aha!


Posted by: oudemia | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 8:21 AM
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It's also that, once the Rose-Mickey storyline ends, Rose is replaced with Martha....conveniently extending the interracial relationship element, but with different players.


Posted by: wrenae | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 8:21 AM
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I wish they had the awesome census maps for interracial relationships. I want to know how my neighborhood stacks up. (I read a joke recently about how a big source of people moving into the neighborhood is white men dating black women and then realizing that Harlem is closer to where they work than Brooklyn is.)


Posted by: Unfoggetarian: "Pause endlessly, then go in" (9) | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 8:22 AM
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I remember being really surprised 10 years ago at the number of interracial couples in Geneva. In addition, while I was in Geneva there was this watch ad everywhere that was a closeup of a dark skinned black man's watch-clad hand on a white woman's naked stomach, which struck me as something you wouldn't see in an advertisement in the US.


Posted by: Unfoggetarian: "Pause endlessly, then go in" (9) | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 8:25 AM
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Apropos of Anglofiles, but nothing else:
Why couldn't the Telegraph get a good copyeditor for their Scrabble Strip Search article? I mean, are they *trying* to give grammarians a collective aneurysm? Who else reads articles about the World Scrabble Championship except us?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/8830718/Demand-for-strip-search-at-World-Scrabble-Championship.html
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Posted by: wrenae | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 8:29 AM
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which struck me as something you wouldn't see in an advertisement in the US

You'd see it in Vogue or W.


Posted by: oudemia | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 8:34 AM
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It wasn't in a magazine, it was posters on the street.


Posted by: Unfoggetarian: "Pause endlessly, then go in" (9) | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 8:42 AM
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Poetic Truths Dep't: The "we are the 53%" gaggle's current Twitter hashtag is #IAM53.

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Posted by: Minivet | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 8:43 AM
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59
Really? Or do you just mean having the companion stay with the gormless boyfriend rather than falling for the Doctor?

That certainly is nice, now that you mention it. But we also get some idea of why she would stay with him, and there's a love interest that sorta kinda makes sense for the Doctor (really, an immortal alien time traveler would probably be interested in someone less conventionally attractive than the usual fresh-faced ingenue, right?), and we see the passage of time in the companions' relationship (from friends to engaged to married and... Spoilers), and they have more to do with the plot than previous companions. I don't want to get into comparing Doctors or writers or whatever across the board, but I certainly do think companions at least are handled better with the 11th.

62
3, 54 - I'm getting a bit confused now. It's good for black/white couples to be shown, but bad if people actually end up with other people roughly the same colour as them? I don't get why the Mickey-Martha thing is unfortunate? They're both heroic resistance fighters or whatever, seems okay to me.

Well, comparing Fred/Gunn/Wesley to the Doctors' companions is... not apples to oranges, but pretty close. (Although now that I think of it, there actually are a lot of similarities between Angel and Doctor Who. Funny.)

As for why it's unfortunate, it is kind of weird pairing off people with little in common but race, but mainly, see "especially considering how out of the blue it was". Had those two even met on screen before we were told they were married? Wikipedia reminds me that yes, they did, technically, but they really weren't developed as a couple at all. To me it just seemed like "OK, we have happy endings for everyone else so far, we really should think of something for those two. I know!"

Obvious disclaimers: I've seen very little of the original series, I'm not British, I rarely know what I'm talking about in general, etc.

88
I watch some of the scenes and think, "Are there really this many black people in London?"

I've had the same thought, but you know, it's funny, if you look it up, nonwhite people are more appropriate in the settings than you'd expect. Martha in Victorian- or Elizabethan-era London doesn't draw attention? There was a black judge of some kind in that time period. Black Secret Service agents under Nixon? Kennedy hired the first, and Nixon had at least one himself. Either the writers/producers have gone out of their way to get this stuff right or they've been lucky or they just have better attitudes about this kind of thing than I do.


Posted by: Cyrus | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 8:46 AM
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Martha in Victorian- or Elizabethan-era London doesn't draw attention? There was a black judge of some kind in that time period.

I'm interested in reading more about this - source? I found reference on TVTropes but nowhere else.


Posted by: Minivet | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 8:55 AM
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There was a black judge of some kind in that time period.

During the same period, many white people rose to positions of prominence in sub-Saharan Africa.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 9:03 AM
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54.--There was a love triangle, and true, she wound up with the white guy in the end

GodDAMMit! I had a feeling that was coming, but they were such a cute couple.

(Yes, I'm a little late playing catch up with this show.)


Posted by: Jackmormon | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 9:17 AM
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There were certainly nonwhite (Indian) MPs in the 19th century; didn't know about the judge.


Posted by: ajay | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 9:17 AM
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101: Heh, that was my source, it doesn't seem to have a link, and I can't find anything better. Sorry, sloppy of me. However, some examples are better documented that that, like this letter Queen Elizabeth wrote complaining about too many black people in London in 1596. Obviously not the same, but still, I think the point stands.


Posted by: Cyrus | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 9:18 AM
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103: If it helps, I don't think they ever made it past necking.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 9:20 AM
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103 gets it exactly right.

Not TV, but to the broader question of how acceptable interracial couples are seen to be, at least up until a couple of years ago the editors of grade-school textbooks were instructed not to use any illustrations of interracial couples, because Texas wouldn't buy the book. Whether Texas would in fact not buy the book I don't know—perhaps this is an instance of prejudice against really quite open-minded Texans—but the effect is the same.


Posted by: Gabardine Bathyscaphe | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 9:24 AM
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The first "matter-of-fact" black-white interracial relationship that I recall in a film was that of a somewhat minor character (aspiring country singer who can't sing Sueleen Gay) in Altman's 1975 Nashville*. For anything that I can recall from before that it was either a "deal" or it was a movie specifically designed to shock silent majoritarians.

*My favorite movie at one time, it did not age that well other than a few of the performances (Barbara Harris in particular). Early Jeff Goldblum on a tri-motorcycle is something to watch for as well.


Posted by: JP Stormcrow | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 10:09 AM
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The first "matter-of-fact" black-white interracial relationship that I recall in a film was that of a somewhat minor character (aspiring country singer who can't sing Sueleen Gay) in Altman's 1975 Nashville*.

I just saw "Fat City" (1972) in which the relationship between Oma (the primary female character, a pathetic barfly) and Earl (the fourth male lead behind Stacy Keach, Jeff Bridges, and Coach from Cheers) would qualify.


Posted by: Cryptic ned | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 10:23 AM
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109: Ah yeah, like that film but forgot that element (and also that it was filmed back in 1972 so pre-dates Nashville). I can highly recommend the book Fat City as well.


Posted by: JP Stormcrow | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 10:28 AM
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it did not age that well other than a few of the performances (Barbara Harris in particular).

Strongly disagree, though it is among other things an incredible window into the mid-1970s.

I think that the hot black chick for the white guy was a staple of action/spy movies by about 1967, but I'd have to go an look for details.


Posted by: Robert Halford | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 10:55 AM
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Maybe it has aged back to OK, but last time I saw it (mid-90s) it had aged into not OK.


Posted by: JP Stormcrow | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 11:04 AM
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Yeah, try it again, you may have been suffering some sort of uncanny valley problem. Really an incredible movie.


Posted by: Robert Halford | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 11:06 AM
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113.last: Well yes, as I said, my favorite movie at one time. And I do think it may have been a combo of having seen it too many times, the wrong number of years in between, and a period when I was mentally tired of [SPOILER ALERT] political violence movies.


Posted by: JP Stormcrow | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 11:23 AM
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On the Wire: The Daniels/Pearlman relationship starts in season 3, I think, but they have to sneak around for the early part of the election campaign.

I think also in season 3, maybe 4, there's a scene when McNulty goes to some suburban/exurban/rural police station and makes a bunch of racist statements to a white cop on the assumption that white cops in the area are racist and then the conversation reveals that the cop is married to a black woman, after which the cop tells Greggs that McNulty is a real asshole.

On another note, MTV used to have some dating show - Blind Date, maybe? - and it was a constant source of discussion among people I knew whether or not they stacked the contestants in order to prevent/make less likely interracial set-ups.


Posted by: fake accent | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 1:59 PM
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84: I dunno, man. When I see Pertwee, I think, "Oooh, I'd like some of that!"*

A woman I worked with in the 1990s was a big SF con organizer. She had an anecdote about how, some time before, Pertwee had been a guest of honor at some Twin Cities con, and she had appeared on stage in a hula costume and placed a garland of flowers around his neck, so that the organizers could claim they had gotten him "lei'd" in Minneapolis. All those years later and she still found it hilarious. Some SF nerds really do live up to their reputation.

I don't even own a digital tuner though, so I don't have much else to say here.


Posted by: Natilo Paennim | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 3:40 PM
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I don't personally know any black/white interracial couples. It is still pretty unusual. Oakland is the headquarters for black/white interracial couples in the bay area.


Posted by: lemmy caution | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 5:17 PM
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Indians are becoming very prevalent on TV. Tons of Indians. There's one on Parks and Rec, I think, on House, on HIMYM, and one on 30 Rock, but I could be wrong. Indians hit the trifecta of a) standing in for all minorities, b) not threatening to whites by virtue of small numbers, and c) looking sort of white, but with dark skin. Being funny helps too.


Posted by: bjk | Link to this comment | 10-18-11 7:10 PM
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100: Dr Who doesn't even see race and the show has never been interested in doing "realistic" timetravel, so the good doctor and his companions have always been able to wander through medieval England in jeans and t-shirt without anybody noticing or caring.

At the same time, as the current Mixed Brittannia run of programmes on mixed race Britain makes clear, there have been Black people for a hell of a lot longer in England than anybody white expects there to have been.


Posted by: Martin Wisse | Link to this comment | 10-19-11 12:26 AM
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Mickey as a hapless idiot that had me slightly puzzled between racist, or if some character's going to be the idiot, why shouldn't it be the black guy

To be fair, New Who kind of has a thing about initially hapless companions' partners becoming heroic. It's getting rather formulaic, to be honest.

As for the OP, I think part of it is that British TV (these days) is more comfortable with matter-of-factness in general.


Posted by: Ginger Yellow | Link to this comment | 10-19-11 2:15 AM
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It's not just Rose and Mickey, but there are many interracial couples, and it's just not a Thing the way it would be here.

Something like half the non-white population of the UK has been in an interracial relationship at some point in their lives, so...


Posted by: Alex | Link to this comment | 10-19-11 2:17 AM
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My therapist said I have a problem with women but I TOTALLY DON'T. There are just TOO MANY BITCHES! I love my mom and she's a woman. I don't see that therapist anymore because she was asking me annoying questions.


Posted by: Pauly Shore | Link to this comment | 10-19-11 3:17 AM
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You guys are THE BEST! Even better than when my mom makes nachos in the microwave!


Posted by: Pauly Shore | Link to this comment | 10-19-11 3:19 AM
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