Hey everyone, it's Tokaro. I've been pre-occupied with some projects as well as Street Fighter IV and Killzone 2. Now, Gamespot recently posted an article concerning racism within recent video game Resident Evil 5. Now as a black male, I look at this game and think one of two things. It's not racist or it's about as racist as the last one.
http://www.gamespot.com/news/blogs/sidebar/909182374/25817098/resident-evil-5-stirs-concerns-of-racism.html
Resident Evil 5 takes place in Africa, thus the infected (Majini) are predominately black. I think gaming journalism needs to get a better grasp of racism. Resident Evil 5 was not created to bring about the destruction of the black race or perpetrate any anti-black discussion or thought. If it was, they could have done it in many, many other ways. You see racism is what one percieves, you look at the situation and you either take it as offense or you do not. This gauges what one would percieve as "racist".
The Africans in Resident Evil 5 are not depicted in a stereotypical way, they have a range of skin types and complexions. The bridge of the nose is realistically pronounced and the facial expression is not that of a guy in blackface.
So I've come to the conclusion that the issue of racism is thrown out by game journalism because of the large playing part of black people in this game, race has become more apparent recently given Barack Obama's induction as the president of the United States. CNN and other Turner channels have shown a variety of "Black in America" type of programs and have not let go of the fact that Barack Obama is a black man.
This sort of recent racial projection has become more and more common post election, also let me give you this. The majority gaming community is comprized of pasty 15-year old foul mouthed caucasian teenagers with a B- to D average due to their lack of awareness and work ethic. Since when have these people been the racial philosphers of our day and age? These people are barely socially aware let alone racially aware. These are the kinds of people who think getting a girlfriend will magically make life wonderful and all your acne will go away and your pecker will grow several extra inches. These people know second-hand rough cut grade school level knowledge about Civil Rights, Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X and The Black Panthers.
If you asked your average racial avenger from GameFAQs about Eldridge Cleaver, Jim Crow Laws or James Baldwin you'd most likely get a "lolwut?"
If someone utters the word "negro" they'll jump at you thinking it shares the same meaning as the endearing and cold "nigger". This is the very ignorance I'm talking about. Also did Resident Evil 4 get flak for the depiction of the Spanish? Did Far Cry 2? That game is legitimately about the African militia men and the bloody legacy of diamonds and firefights in the African plain. Army of Two depicts the war in Somalia, is Army of Two racist? Basically anything with a black person in it is racist. And jeez Gamespot, you could have called Capcom on something actually tangeble instead of working to extrapolate on an issue that doesn't exist.
Look at Oil Man!
RESIDENT EVIL 5
RACISM
In closing, read a book you ignorant sods. Resident Evil 5 isn't anti-black propaganda that Capcom whipped up. It's just another mediocre third-person "survival horror" shooter.
7 comments:
Yo, this is ColbatReign after losing his blogspot password
I think this entry is entirely too serious for this blog, but I'll still respond:
I've never played RE5, just watched my bud play a little, so I can't really tell about the protrayal of blacks in the game, but I read your blog and it doesn't address this: RE5 could have taken place anywhere in the world. Why in Africa? Why does the majority of the people you brutally murder have to be black? (And why is the fact that you are brutally murdering people raise less eyebrows than the race of the murdered imo?)
My guess: I think you are just a tad off. Capcom knew that murdering blax would give the game publicity, and thus sales. Tho I definitely agree that people are making too big of a deal out of it. I just don't agree with your "it's definitely not there not one bit" idea, and your race alone doesn't give you credibility to say that.
And dear Zues do I agree that pastey flucky nerds are not the ones who should vocal about race issues.
i dunno, i'll probably agree with tokaro on this one. like you say CB, the venue could've been anywhere other than africa. suppose it was china, and you'd have to moider like 50 dozen c-folk. or if the country were, i dunno, some middle-eastern or russian state.
i mean, that still amounts to the same thing, right?
First of all, stop reading gamespot, it's an ugly awful website.
Secondly, this whole racism point. I'm not sure that anyone is claiming that this game is intentionally racist or was created as racist propaganda. What I see most people saying is that the game is rather racially insensitive and could have handled things much better. The black people in the game are never presented in any way aside from in a menacing light and the game uses numerous historically racist images in order to portray them. For example, in one chapter the Africans are portrayed in grass skirts and tribal masks with spears. Not only is this a largely inaccurate view of modern Africa, its also an image that has been used in media for AGES to portray black people as primitive, violent and uncivilized.
The intro cutscene is another example of this. Sheva says "welcome to Africa" (and the fact that Sheva is introduced with a shot of her ass could probably touch off another entire conversation about the inherent sexism in most games) and then proceeds to lead Chris through a seemingly normal african shantytown. There are no indications during the cinema that the africans in this town are infected with any kind of virus yet they are still portrayed very menacingly. The camera angles and POV shots used are as reminiscent of horror movie tropes as to be lifted identically from them. This is a disturbing bit of footage as it essentially presents the africans in the game as a threat, without any context whatsoever or logical reason why they should be one, aside from where they live.
Now clearly the creators of this game are from Japan and are most likely not at all as sensitive to racial matters as many people in other parts of the world are, so I doubt there was any intention in any of these things, but there was clearly quite a bit of ignorance during the making of the game. The classic film/literature setting of "deepest darkest africa" is certainly an appealing one for a game that purports to be in the "horror" genre, but it is also a setting that has been used in the past to marginalize, cause fright and degrade black people for many years. Perhaps a little more sensitivity would have been a nice thing.
yes, even i've heard that the japanese have a bit of an issue with color / race insensitivity.
ColbatReign here again. I watched Yahtzee's RE5 review. It sounds about right. he says, more or less:
"Since I know that people are going to nag me about it: At first, Africa's protrayal in RE5 seems fair. Sure, most of it run-down and 50 years behind the rest of the world, but that's more or less the reality of it. However, all of this goes out the window when black people show up in grass skirts and tiki masks and start chucking wooden spears at poor [progranist]. It seems as if the developers tried to make a fair protrayal of Africa, and failed miserably. It's not that Capcom is run by a bunch of racists, but it's that they're idiots."
Of course, he said it in a much more hilarious way imo.
Anyways, this is has been Ripcord Gogger's latest blog post for way too long. This subject matter is way too serious for this blog. And by god if this starts a wave of super-serious social issues blog posts I will personally BUST ROLF toki!
geegus cripes, lemme just invite you all over again Mr Anonymous!!
ColbatReign: def, send me another invite at ConstipatedMonkey@gmail.com
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