Musing 1

Well.. expect a lot of rambling in today's blog... I'm a little tired, so my crud censor bar is a little lower than usual.

On Sunday (a couple days ago), my parents were out. I was 'babysat' by my brother's au pair, though all she really needed to do was give Vincent (my brother) a bath (He's 5) and put him to bed. So it was more like I was home alone, later on in the night. While Vince was still awake, I watched the Brady Bunch Movie. It danced between funny and downright cheesy, but whatever, I'm not here to talk about the Brady Bunch Movie.

That night, it was puking with rain.

Everyone was upstairs, Vincent, the au-pair.. I was by myself. Wikipedia searchings could've absorbed my whole night, but I pulled myself from the PC, switched on the living room lights and - *flicker* one of them flashed, then they all went out. I've had this problem with the lights for a while now... flickering and crud. With the living room lights came the kitchen and utility room lights, until practically the whole of the lower storey of the house was light-less. I was lucky the rest of the downstairs lights didn't flash out (the hall light was still on). So, I went into the playroom, got the mobile phone, switched on the pathetically weak built-in torch, and proceeded to look for an actual torch in the pitch black kitchen. See, at that point I was ever so slightly scared.

I found one, with flat batteries... then another one... with equally flat batteries. I thought, in a real blackout, I be thief-food by now. I found batteries, after some long ruffling around in the draws, used them to flick the power back on for the downstairs light from the garage.. then settled down to watch some Afro Samurai (and this is the part were things actually become a little more relevant) and pondered.

Why are black people so rare in anime (westernised anime too)?

Why are minorities so rare in anime? (Wait a bit, it becomes a lil' more general still)

Why are there so many stereotypes in cartoons? (especially minorities)

(and no, I don't usually go on and on about racism and stereotypes all the time, I just encountered a lot of them this month)

I mean, think about it. Afro Samurai. A black dude with a stereotyped American accent, complete with a hip-hop-ish theme tune.

Another example? American Dragon: Jake Long. Chinese guy. Involved with dragons and ancient Chinese folklore. Have I seen anything that differs from this? Wendy Wu, Jackie Chan Adventures... the list goes on.. all stereotypes. Even Samurai Jack, which I think is absolutely too cool.

And an Asian cartoon character? (I'm British, so when I say Asian here it means Pakistani/Indian) ULTRA SUPER RARE!

Fair?

Mmm... ponder on that. While you're at it, (If you're British) ponder on why about 60-70% of TV shows in Britain are American. And the stereotypes in our mind come from what we see on TV, which the stereotypers have used as a method to spread these thoughts subconsciously. I'm not saying that TV shows are being made to spread stereotypes, I'm just saying that that's what some TV programs are doing anyways. It's wrong and really annoying.


Should-bes

1. No cartoon, be it anime or otherwise should be stereotyped as I'm sure I'm not the only one who's sick of it.

2. Britain as a whole needs some more quality representatives in the Arts and media. At least on British TV.

3. Jake Long:American Dragon needs to be canceled and the script-writers slapped. I'm seeing so many stereotypes when I watch it, it makes me lose faith in the world.

That's it.