Episode 692 - Benevolent racism and other isms!
Jun 17, 2024
Benevolent racism, sexism, ableism, and whatever other “isim” is an interesting aspect of those otherwise negative things. It's not as obvious in its negativity, it's well-meaning and yet quite misguided. So what is it? The term “Benevolent” makes it seem nice and harmless and that IS how people mean it, but that's because they're a bit clueless and ignorant. Benevolent sexism, ableism, and racism is basically using a “positive” stereotype to characterise someone based on their ethnicity, gender rather than as a real person etc, like “all black people have natural rhythm”, or “women are more sensitive and in touch with nature”, or “blind people have all their other senses massively heightened”.
Topics and Show Notes
So why is that a problem, you might ask? Because a stereotype that characterises an individual based on an assumption about their gender, their ethnicity or any other group they belong to is STILL a stereotype, it's still false and has nothing to do with them as an INDIVIDUAL person. What people really do when they use these benevolent stereotypes is to keep that person “other” from themselves, preventing them from relating to that person as a fellow human. It also puts the person in an awkward position, having to fit into or live up to standards that have nothing to do with them, i.e. “I'm an Asian so that means I have to be amazing at maths, a doctor, expert at martial arts, and constantly doing spiritual Buddhist ceremonies…”
Anything that prevents us properly relating to people as fellow humans is a problem whether it's openly negative or seemingly positive. The argument in favour of benevolent stereotypes is to combat the negative ones and in that it has a place, a limited one but a place nonetheless. Think about the old “noble Savage” idea, native people used to be universally looked down upon but then this idea developed that they had a “nobility” of their own, free from the constraints of civilisation, they were in touch with the natural world etc. For black people it was the “magical Negro”, an older black person who's only trait seemed to be that they were friendly and there to offer wise life advice to white people. For south Asian people it was unarmed martial arts expertise, spirituality, and ceremony. For gay people it was “the gay best friend” who would give sage love-life advice to a female main character, do her hair and pick our her shoes and look fabulous. These stereotypes served the purpose of combating negative images and making a place for these groups in the mainstream. They had a place, but their time has passed.
Examples are legion and usually very silly. Can you recognise them when you see them? Have you experienced them yourself? Do you use them yourself? What are some you can think of? One I hate the most is when bad stand up comedians tell us the “differences” between men and women, and it's just a list of stupid stereotypes.
This week Gunwallace was under the weather so we reissued - Space Repair Garage The Comic - Groove into this easy-going, saucy space symphony of high tech bleep-blooping cool! You’ll be carried along on a flaming column of power as it slowly ramps up to epic proportions, and then be left alone, coasting in space as it suddenly cuts out. (from Quackcast 415)
Topics and shownotes
Links
Featured comic:
Drunk Duck Awards 2024 - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2024/jun/11/featured-comic-drunk-duck-awards-2024/
Featured music:
Space Repair Garage The Comic - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Space_Repair_Garage_The_Comic/ - by Ninja_bait, rated E.
Special thanks to:
Gunwallace - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Gunwallace/
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Episode 691 - Thirst Trap
Jun 10, 2024
Thirst trap is the topic of today's Quackcast! What is a thirst trap? It's basically someone presenting themselves as very sexy in order to get attention for some sort of reason, rather than just happening to look attractive. So it's usually used for some sort of advertising purpose, to sell their OnlyFans, to get a date, or more conventional advertising. Today we're talking about it it terms of comics :)
Episode 679 - Correlation doesn't equal causation
Mar 18, 2024
The phrase “Correlation doesn't equal causation” is something associated with science and statistics but it really applies to EVERYTHING and that's important to understand. But was does it mean? If a bunch of things happened at the same time, those things aren't necessarily related or causal. An example Tantz gives is that statistics show in the summer there are more drownings and that people eat more ice cream. That means that those two things are correlated. We know they aren't causal though: ice ream doesn't drown people and people drowning don't cause people to eat more ice cream… the third hidden variable is that it's summer: it's the rise in temperature that causes people to want more ice cream and to swim more, which increases the chances of drowning.
Episode 677 - You can't spell "Fail" without "AI"
Mar 4, 2024
I remembered that a promised Quackcast was AI: slavery for artists and creators. This is an important subject to cover especially from this angle.
Episode 672 - Fave Fantasy Creatures
Jan 29, 2024
A fun topic this time. We decided to chat about our fave fantasy creatures. Mine was elves, Banes' had the bigfoot and Tantz had dragons! We chat about where our love started, why we think we like the creatures and a bit about the creatures themselves.
Episode 662 - Drunkduck tales
Nov 20, 2023
Webcomic communities have different cultures, but why and where do they come from? DD's culture is pretty chill, we're reasonably neutral and accepting of a wide range of ideas and perspectives, we're egalitarian to a very high degree, we don't do cliques, we don't exclude, we don't tend to jump on culture wars… We don't like tribalism of partisanship. So why are we like that?
Episode 658 - Marvelous musicals
Oct 23, 2023
We're chatting about the subject of musicals for this particular Quackcast. You might think this has nothing to do with webcomics but webcomic musicals popup from time to time, like The Black Parade on DD by Ashlee S.
Episode 649 - Gendered clothing
Aug 21, 2023
When you're drawing people in a webcomic one of the common ways to indicate gender is by outfits, but why are clothes gendered at all and is that a constant?
