Subject:
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Re: Something not right about Captain Ahnee and the Dipwads?
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Tue, 7 Nov 2000 15:25:34 GMT
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Viewed:
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970 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Josh Spaulding writes:
> Glad to read your post, Chris. We've got some disagreements, but I was
> mainly concerned that my tone would come off as condescending or insulting.
Even if you do, I can deal with it. :-)
> > How so? There are some strong negative feelings toward JarJar either because
> > he's goofy or because he's a marketing tool. The fact that he's ficticious • is
> > lucky. What if he was not? Why would those negative feelings not still • hold?
> > I have witnessed people hurt others simply because they were goofy. How is • it
> > so ludicrous to extrapolate from expressed feelings toward that?
>
> I'm not sure if you're referring to the Jar Jar of the movie, or of the
> online comic. "Lucky" is a strange word choice
I sort of meant lucky for him. That is most especially, the him that would be
if he were a sentient.
> in either case, since both
> works obviously required significant time and effort. It is more than
> serendipity that divides them from documentary works. If, instead of a
> humorous, ironic online comic, I was shown footage of a person beating
> another to death as retribution for nonsensical babbling and clumsiness, I
> would react with distaste...
The archetype behind the Jar-jar character is human. When we watch him in all
his glory in the TPM, we don't see a big-eared freak, we see an annoying
person. Obviously, we see the big-eared freak too, but when we internalize the
story, we do so with those characters as people.
For you and I, seeing this character brutalized might not pose a problem. For
other folks it might. It is a plausible hypothesis, regardless of all the
contrary unfounded ranting, but certainly not strongly supported by evidence,
that witnessing brutality in a context of "good clean fun" causes a disonance
in the processing of thoughts, emotions, ethics, etc. And that this disonance
may lead some people (kids is what most people claim, but they're just small
people) to exhibit less constructive behavior.
As a young adult (teen) I victimized people. I knew it was wrong. I would
never have done it as a kid. I would never do it now. What was wrong with me
then? No one knows. There are scads of theories, and probably many of them
have grains of truth that interact for the real explanation. And maybe part of
that was that as a middle-teen I developed a real taste for violent media. The
idea of desensitization is quite well supported, but where we take our
behavior from there is not clear.
So in the broader sense, exposure to violent ideals is quite possibly a bad
thing. Portraying the brutalization of someone because they're different and a
bit annoying (like geeky pre-teens in jr. high) might be dangerous. Regardless
of what you think on this, you don't know it. No one does. And if it is that
way, then I think we _all_ have a responsibility to modify our actions and
perceptions of acceptable.
Now that I've ranted on about that. I want to clearly state that while I
believe we do have responsibilities (and lots of them) I side firmly in the
camp of people who almost allways don't want to enforce them. I want to
explain them and let you do what you will.
> > Is it possible that instead of I having a problem differentiating between
> > fiction and reality, you have a problem seeing how fiction and reality are
> > similar?
>
> ...but I recognize that the behavior of a fictional character cannot be so
> easily equated with the real-life proclivities of the author.
An author doesn't have to come out and agree with abuse to sitll propegate it
as acceptable. And it's worse if he doesn't because then, he risks increasing
the amount of abuse in the world while simultaneously thinking that it's a bad
thing.
> > would fell such animosity toward a clumsy person engaged in high-pitch
> > jabbering, but only so long as you didn't happen to know about their • redeeming
> > qualities. Right? If not, then why not?
>
> Fair. You're probably right, someone who annoyed me, yet presented no
> redeeming qualities would probably stir feelings of animousity in me. This
> is less than a perfect thing, and I guess I'm not quite Buddha/Jesus
> material. But I do have the compassion, moral awareness, and sense of
> responsibility to avoid violent conflicts with those who displease me.
Right. Me too. But not always. I'm a perfectly peaceful person who sometimes
even gets annoying about promoting peacefull attitudes. One who thinks that
physical violence has no place in my life short of the time when something has
gotten so serious that it's time to kill someone. I'd rather be knocked around
a little than fight back.
But when I was seventeen, and looking at someone who annoyed me to the extent
that many of the people in these related threads seem to be annoyed by Jar-jar,
I might very well have pushed him down a stairwell at school. Or bombed his
car. I never did any of those specific things, just because somone near me was
obnoxious, but it could have happened.
How do you explain this perfectly peaceful guy who could have engaged in that
kind of activity?
And maybe that's not you. But I am PROOF that people like that do exist. Do
you want encouraging them to beat up goofy others on your hands?
> But the situation we were discussing was unlike this. We weren't talking
> about attacking people, we were talking about fictional acts of violence
> against fictional characters.
As I explained above, I think you perceive this as a crucial difference, and it
is in as much as the behavior doesn't directly harm anyone, but it may have
ramifications that do affect real people.
> Sorry. My intent was to suggest that if you find a thing funny and I don't,
> or vice-versa, then it's not that big a deal.
And I agree with that. And I even think that the comic should have been left
unedited...unless the author had a change of heart, I guess.
> I meant to say that I was more
> interested in discussing our logic re: the relationship between an author
> and his works, than in weighing the merits of our potentially differing
> tastes.
Great. Me too. (And I like lots of tasteless stuff, so I'm not up on a
high-horse anyway.)
> > And a further point is that portrayal of discrimination suggests an
> > approval of it.
>
> That's not a valid assumption.
Right. I said what I meant wrong. Not approval. But that portrayal signifies
an indiscriminant attitude about any long-reacing effects.
> An easy example: Eric Cartman, one of the
> main characters of the South Park movie and series, is known for his
> extraordinary racism, chauvinism, and homophobia.
I've only seen one episode, so I hadn't exactly picked up on that, but OK.
> Yet the creators of that
> show are openly homosexual. By your logic, the existence of the Cartman
> character suggests Parker and Stone approve of bigotry against homosexuals.
And clearly that doesn't make sense. But I think that if anyone empathized
with Cartman, then they would be risking the propogation of a personally
offensive idea. So, either that's stupid, or they're making it pointedly clear
that Cartman is a retard. (I vote for the second option.)
> Or maybe this: some fiction exists merely for entertainment, not
> as a moral parable.
Nah. Artists tell themselves that, but it's a cop out. It's horse pucky.
Fiction, created as only entertainment, stilla acts as a moral parable to some
of the audience. Maybe lots of the audience, but I'm sure that varies.
> > > Again: Digital representation of toy image of CGI construct of fictional
> > > lifeform from fictional planet =/= (does not equal) real person.
> >
> > How old must you be to _really_ understand this? How old are the kids who
> > might be exposed to the comic?
>
> well, as a parent, I think you're qualified to judge whether your kids are
> capable of understanding such things, and you have the difficult
> responsibility of monitoring the sorts of things they are exposed to.
Do you believe, irrespective of what our law says, that all people (even
barring significant retardation) reach that level of sophistication? When you
study learning theories, you find that most of the big ones include stages of
develpoment of some kind. As you read throught the requirements, you also find
that many adults really never fully actualize at those highest levels.
So while we sit here assuring each other that Jar-jar isn't a real person. I'm
pretty sure that even at the core of our own minds, the way we internalize and
make our own the story, he is. He is clearly a person. He represents a person
in the story. So, what about for others who (assuming that we're at the top)
are less developed intellectually (or whatever)?
I agree to some extent that it's the role of the parents to guide thier kids.
(Although, I'm an adamant supporter of freedom for kids, really more than
almost any of you would agree with.) But I'm not sure that only kids might be
harmed by violent media.
I hope it's OK that I generalized most of this away from the JJB comic that
started this. I really do think it's a bigger issue of violent media exposure
in general.
Chris
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