Recently there
was a protest around all the ABC news stations around the US that were asking for an apology and to fire Jimmy Kimmel. During the talk show hosted by Jimmy Kimmel on
October 16, 2013, he asked a group of young children what they should do about the U.S. debt to China on
his live show on the ABC channel. One of the children responded and said “kill everyone is
China”. What Jimmy Kimmel replied is, “that’s
a interesting idea”. As the child might think it is just a joke; however, to
the Chinese people, it is an act of racism and offense. After the talk show
aired on TV, more than 100,000 people have signed a petition asking for the
White House to investigate the show. Although, ABC already apologized for this
type of response from Jimmy Kimmel Live show, the Chinese people are still upset about the fact that this is still happening in today’s America.
Once I saw this video, I immediately think of the concepts
that we had been discussing through the whole semester and how this issue is
related to our class topic. Many people think this is considered to be genocide,
where the purpose is to kill all the people from one specific race. One of the questions
that came up to my mind is “are we living in a post-racism America?”
Below is the link to watch the Oct. 16, 2013 Jimmy Kimmel
Live show.
We are not living in a post-racist society. From the comment the child made, even if it was a joke, but I doubt that it was, clearly demonstrates there are people who have racist tendencies. I’ve definitely heard similar comments made by people that suggest killing a certain race to solve problems. That is racist! We can also see that we are not living in a post-racist society in the ways minorities are represented in the media. Blacks, Latinas, Asians, etc. are underrepresented in the news and in film. If they do have a presence on those platforms they have minor roles and are only a very small percentage of major roles.
ReplyDeleteI missed this incident, but it seems as though Jimmy Kimmel is getting into a lot of trouble these days. Although many of his skits are intended to be a joke he took this one too far. I do think since we are in so much debt to China that it actually puts us in a "underprivileged" lower position and maybe makes it seem like something we can joke around about. But, it becomes a racist issue when people think a joke like this is actually funny or as Jimmy Kimmel would say, "that's an interesting idea."
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with Janel. As much as we want to believe that we are living in a post-racist society, that is not the case - not even close. People can say "It's a joke" all they want. But just acknowledging the idea in a comedic manner (even though it's not even funny) shows that the idea is still existent in people of society, which is very unfortunate.
ReplyDelete