TV/Movies Megathread

[The Brain]

Seems like an irrelevant aside as I don't believe homeland presents Christian Arabs. Just brown Muslims doing terrible things.

Others in this thread claim that the show also showed white Muslims doing terrible things?

[garbon]

Just throw in a few white Muslims doing terrible things. Plenty of them.

That's what the first two seasons were about.

Huh. I thought there were just brown Muslims.

Ah well I never saw the show and have no interest in ever seeing it so what am I even doing in this conversation?

There was one token one (which just served to underline how terrible Islam is).

Also, I don't think pointing out a suggestion on how to make a show look less slanted demonstrates that it isn't slanted.

[garbon]

Seems like an irrelevant aside as I don't believe homeland presents Christian Arabs. Just brown Muslims doing terrible things.

Others in this thread claim that the show also showed white Muslims doing terrible things?

One brainwashed by evil terrorists.

[The Brain]

Seems like an irrelevant aside as I don't believe homeland presents Christian Arabs. Just brown Muslims doing terrible things.

Others in this thread claim that the show also showed white Muslims doing terrible things?

One brainwashed by evil terrorists.

Roger.

A wider point is that I get the impression that many people use "racism" for anything that is negative and they disagree with (a bit like some people use "democracy" for everything they like). It's perfectly possible (and my impression is that it's not very unusual) to be bigotted against Muslims and hold any number of weird and despicable views on them. That doesn't make the views racist. Such persons may or may not also hold racist views, but that doesn't make all their views racist. Edit: forgot to say, by claiming that bigotry against a religion is racism they make it seem like it's somehow not bad in itself but only bad if it's racism. It trivializes bigotry against religions (and other ideologies), which I'm not sure is a very positive thing to do.

An even wider point of course is the general effort by many people to destroy language and make words devoid of meaning. My opinion on those people is a negative one, but, I think, not a racist one.

[garbon]

Seems like an irrelevant aside as I don't believe homeland presents Christian Arabs. Just brown Muslims doing terrible things.

Others in this thread claim that the show also showed white Muslims doing terrible things?

One brainwashed by evil terrorists.

Roger.

A wider point is that I get the impression that many people use "racism" for anything that is negative and they disagree with (a bit like some people use "democracy" for everything they like). It's perfectly possible (and my impression is that it's not very unusual) to be bigotted against Muslims and hold any number of weird and despicable views on them. That doesn't make the views racist. Such persons may or may not also hold racist views, but that doesn't make all their views racist.

An even wider point of course is the general effort by many people to destroy language and make words devoid of meaning. My opinion on those people is a negative one, but, I think, not a racist one.

I think you are being a bit pedantic. I suppose people could say I think the show is being bigoted against Palestinians, Iranians, Afghanis...etc. who in the show are all portrayed as being Muslim in the show in a terrible light - but that doesn't really easily come off the tongue. Also, as the article I linked to suggests, it is a bit more than religious tolerance that could be troubling in the show as it is also the way in which the portray societies in those countries.

To your wider point, I can't speak for said bigotry beyond the US and UK, but in my experience and what I've heard anecdotally/read about, when people holding such views choose to be aggressive about them they largely target individuals deeming what they perceive to be wearing Islamic garb as well as individuals that fit the profile of who they think Muslims look like. They are not thinking that Muslims look like their white grandmother - which is where a good deal of that racist component comes in.

[garbon]

An even wider point of course is the general effort by many people to destroy language and make words devoid of meaning. My opinion on those people is a negative one, but, I think, not a racist one.

Thought worth speaking directly to this bit. Language isn't static and meanings evolve. And understandable in this sense when religious identity isn't always readily available, so the intolerant look for proxies like the brown skinned appearance common to many Muslims. A terrible proxy to my mind, given that brown skin is common to many non-Muslim identities but then I'm not the one directing the intolerant.

[The Brain]

Seems like an irrelevant aside as I don't believe homeland presents Christian Arabs. Just brown Muslims doing terrible things.

Others in this thread claim that the show also showed white Muslims doing terrible things?

One brainwashed by evil terrorists.

Roger.

A wider point is that I get the impression that many people use "racism" for anything that is negative and they disagree with (a bit like some people use "democracy" for everything they like). It's perfectly possible (and my impression is that it's not very unusual) to be bigotted against Muslims and hold any number of weird and despicable views on them. That doesn't make the views racist. Such persons may or may not also hold racist views, but that doesn't make all their views racist.

An even wider point of course is the general effort by many people to destroy language and make words devoid of meaning. My opinion on those people is a negative one, but, I think, not a racist one.

I think you are being a bit pedantic. I suppose people could say I think the show is being bigoted against Palestinians, Iranians, Afghanis...etc. who in the show are all portrayed as being Muslim in the show in a terrible light - but that doesn't really easily come off the tongue. Also, as the article I linked to suggests, it is a bit more than religious tolerance that could be troubling in the show as it is also the way in which the portray societies in those countries.

To your wider point, I can't speak for said bigotry beyond the US and UK, but in my experience and what I've heard anecdotally/read about, when people holding such views choose to be aggressive about them they largely target individuals deeming what they perceive to be wearing Islamic garb as well as individuals that fit the profile of who they think Muslims look like. They are not thinking that Muslims look like their white grandmother - which is where a good deal of that racist component comes in.

I certainly think there's a significant overlap statistically between bigotry against Islam and bigotry against brown people (racism), at least among the mouth-breathing part of the population.

[The Brain]

An even wider point of course is the general effort by many people to destroy language and make words devoid of meaning. My opinion on those people is a negative one, but, I think, not a racist one.

Thought worth speaking directly to this bit. Language isn't static and meanings evolve. And understandable in this sense when religious identity isn't always readily available, so the intolerant look for proxies like the brown skinned appearance common to many Muslims. A terrible proxy to my mind, given that brown skin is common to many non-Muslim identities but then I'm not the one directing the intolerant.

Well we have to agree to disagree on this point. "Languages change" is often advanced as a bogus argument to mask an effort to blur important distinctions (people who advance it often don't treat it as the two-way street it is, which makes the mask drop).

[garbon]

An even wider point of course is the general effort by many people to destroy language and make words devoid of meaning. My opinion on those people is a negative one, but, I think, not a racist one.

Thought worth speaking directly to this bit. Language isn't static and meanings evolve. And understandable in this sense when religious identity isn't always readily available, so the intolerant look for proxies like the brown skinned appearance common to many Muslims. A terrible proxy to my mind, given that brown skin is common to many non-Muslim identities but then I'm not the one directing the intolerant.

Well we have to agree to disagree on this point. "Languages change" is often advanced as a bogus argument to mask an effort to blur important distinctions (people who advance it often don't treat it as the two-way street it is, which makes the mask drop).

Here I don't think the distinction is all that meaningful - particularly as it is often infused with that racial component.  That said, I don't actually encounter that many people who would talk about being racist about Muslims. More on religious intolerance and the inability of bigots to actually identify who is a Muslim and who is not.

[Josephus]

John Cleese's new sitcom is awful 

What's it called? Where's it air?

[Josephus]

Seems like an irrelevant aside as I don't believe homeland presents Christian Arabs. Just brown Muslims doing terrible things.

Others in this thread claim that the show also showed white Muslims doing terrible things?

seasons one and two (which were based on an Israeli show) followed an American soldier captured in Iraq, who's released but has secretly converted to Islam and is plotting a very bad thing upon his return to america. He was very white.

[garbon]

Seems like an irrelevant aside as I don't believe homeland presents Christian Arabs. Just brown Muslims doing terrible things.

Others in this thread claim that the show also showed white Muslims doing terrible things?

seasons one and two (which were based on an Israeli show) followed an American soldier captured in Iraq, who's released but has secretly converted to Islam and is plotting a very bad thing upon his return to america. He was very white.

As I noted, the evil brown Muslims did that to him.

[Berkut]

An even wider point of course is the general effort by many people to destroy language and make words devoid of meaning. My opinion on those people is a negative one, but, I think, not a racist one.

Thought worth speaking directly to this bit. Language isn't static and meanings evolve. And understandable in this sense when religious identity isn't always readily available, so the intolerant look for proxies like the brown skinned appearance common to many Muslims. A terrible proxy to my mind, given that brown skin is common to many non-Muslim identities but then I'm not the one directing the intolerant.

Its important that idenity politics have an easily identifiable identity to be outraged about, and racism is the trump card for this effort, so everything that the left wing nutjobs want to be outraged about must be racist.

It really isn't that complicated.

The show shows some Muslims in abad light, so it must be racist. The fact that the primary Muslim villain in the show is painfully, excruciatingly white is no reason to not be outraged about the "racism", we just need to re-define what racism means so we can make sure our outrages is outrage against racism!

[Berkut]

Seems like an irrelevant aside as I don't believe homeland presents Christian Arabs. Just brown Muslims doing terrible things.

Others in this thread claim that the show also showed white Muslims doing terrible things?

seasons one and two (which were based on an Israeli show) followed an American soldier captured in Iraq, who's released but has secretly converted to Islam and is plotting a very bad thing upon his return to america. He was very white.

Still racism. It is all racism, all the time. If it isn't, that is a failure in your definition of racism, clearly.

[garbon]

An even wider point of course is the general effort by many people to destroy language and make words devoid of meaning. My opinion on those people is a negative one, but, I think, not a racist one.

Thought worth speaking directly to this bit. Language isn't static and meanings evolve. And understandable in this sense when religious identity isn't always readily available, so the intolerant look for proxies like the brown skinned appearance common to many Muslims. A terrible proxy to my mind, given that brown skin is common to many non-Muslim identities but then I'm not the one directing the intolerant.

Its important that idenity politics have an easily identifiable identity to be outraged about, and racism is the trump card for this effort, so everything that the left wing nutjobs want to be outraged about must be racist.

It really isn't that complicated.

The show shows some Muslims in abad light, so it must be racist. The fact that the primary Muslim villain in the show is painfully, excruciatingly white is no reason to not be outraged about the "racism", we just need to re-define what racism means so we can make sure our outrages is outrage against racism!

Just wanted to make clear that I'm pointedly not engaging with your posts as it is clear you aren't really posting in good faith. You've started with the principle that all of it must be bad and therefore there's nothing at all relevant about the discussion of religious intolerance and the impact that shows like Homeland can have on perceptions.  Doesn't really seem like it would be worth engaging you in a discussion so after this, I'll refrain from commenting.