Crash-racial stereotyping and prejudice

The movie Crash has many examples of racial stereotyping and prejudice. From the very beginning stereotypes against multiple races are shown. There are a wealthy white man and woman walking down the street and Jean holds onto her purse and moves closer to her husband Rick when she sees two black men walking toward them. Anthony and Peter, the two black men walking toward Jean and Rick notice Jean’s reaction and they hijack Rick and Jean’s SUV. This confirmed the negative feelings that Jean had toward black men. When they get home she wants the locks changed because her purse was stolen and the car keys with the house keys were in the hands of strangers. Rick hired a Mexican man to do the lock replacement. Jean comes downstairs and sees the Mexican man and gets very upset. She makes some racial remarks about Daniel going out and selling the new keys to his “homies” and she wants the locks changed again the next day. Rick thinks that she is being irrational. She screams at him that she just got a gun shoved in her face and how is she supposed to feel.

Cameron and Christine are a black well off couple. They experience stereotyping and racism when they are driving home from a party. A white police officer pulls them over for driving while black. He makes them both get out of the car and does a search on both Cameron and Christine. Officer Ryan has Cameron and Christine stand next to each other so Cameron can see what he does to his wife. Ryan runs his hands up Christine’s legs and fingers her. Cameron does nothing to stop this violation of his wife because he is afraid of the legal consequences of speaking out against a white police officer. Cameron and Christine got in a fight when they got home because Christine was angry that Cameron did not stick up for her to Ryan. Ryan also had a white partner with him, Hansen, that thinks the inappropriate search is wrong but does nothing to stop it because Ryan is his partner.

Farhad is a Middle Eastern store owner who fears for the safety of his family because everyone thinks of them as terrorist because of the 9/11 attacks. His store gets broken into and there is graffiti written all over the walls. He hires Daniel to fix the lock on the back wall that Jean and Rick hired. When Daniel goes home to his family his little girl runs out to meet him. As she runs out the front door she almost gets shot by a stray bullet from a black man doing a drive by. Daniel jumps in front of her so she doesn’t get hit, the bullet was blank. Daniel tells the little girl that an angel is watching over them because he did not die.

Graham is a black officer who has a Hispanic partner, Rita. They are dating in addition to being partners. At one point they are lying in bed together and the phone rings. Graham answers it and tells his mom that he will talk to her later that he is with a white woman. Rita gets mad at this because she is Puerto Rican and the only reason he said he was with a white woman was because that would make is mom angrier than if he would have said he was with a Hispanic woman.

There are many examples of racism and stereotypes in the movie Crash. It is blatant and outright racism with some of the characters. Anthony, Jean, and Ryan have the most obvious feelings of racism. Rick, Hansen, and Peter do not have strong racist feelings but they do little or nothing to stop the racist behavior of their wife, partner, and friend.

Something about the subject makes it hard to name

Gloria Yamamato

This reading talks about racism and how it wont be demolished easy and will not be easy to get rid of. Racism is evident everywhere in our world and can not be resolved easily. Taking necessary actions in everyday life, having discussions with others, and trying to open the eyes and minds of others can help the with racism but will not completely take it away. In the reading there are four different types of racism discussed that can be found in our society, aware/blatant, aware/covert, unaware/unintentional, and unaware/self-righteous racism. I feel that being aware and covert about it can be the best because you know about racism and are low key about how you feel on it. Some people are born into families that have hate for other races and groups which can have an affect on someone. With openess and a will minds can always be changed and things can be seen differently. The forms of racism discussed in my opinion are all negative and wrong. People should just look at life for what it is and not base decisions on people because of their race and groups they associate themselves with. Through this reading i find myself more aware to the types of racism and how some people minds are.

SEXISM IN THE GAMING INDUSTRY

Video games have always been a male preferred thing to do. I feel the reason games are becoming more and more appealing for men is the fact that men play games more than women especially at an older age. The arguments for this article is that videos, movies, etc., are portraying their characters as products and not people. Our society today is filled with a lot of different things that can exploit an individual or group in ways people may have no interest or have aa high interest for. Its all about marketing and sells. Money is powerful in our world and trying to get the most is everyone's goal especially in advertisement. The way games are advertised is to make money, not to really worry about who thinks its wrong to sell and who thinks its not the right message but its a business. Games have real life situations in them which can be harmful to some people and age groups and should probably not be sold to a younger audience who may not get the concepts, this is why games come with warning labels and age prefered players.

Racial Formation

Race is something that is biologically inherited but the constructs that go along with it are socially constructed. Science can be used to put people in different groups, in different societies race is looked at differently because of the social standings and the make up of that society. Part of the way that society breaks people into groups is by exploitation. When one group of peoples feels that they are superior to another and enough of them believe it they can make things happen. Exploitation and oppression are very powerful tools when it comes to breaking down people’s spirit. In the reading Race Formation it goes through the development of racial classifications have come about through out the years. It first started with scientific classifications then it moved to political classifications. Classifications based solely on a facial feature or gene is incorrect because of the diversity within the population of people as a whole.