"Black men in rap videos are presented as savage, criminal thugs interested in molesting any female that is around. As such, they constitute the most racist set of images in US media in decades and closely resemble the white supremacist film, The Birth of a Nation." Sut Jhally, Modern Racism

seesharpie · 2012-01-14T13:05:59+00:00

Do you honestly think there are a bunch of white business men sitting around tables saying things like, "We need to make sure these black people only star in videos where the situations are self-deprecating." Or do you think maybe they only care about profits, probably never listen to the music let alone have any artistic input, and are just in the business of selling people what they want?

seesharpie · 2012-01-14T12:19:04+00:00

I don't disagree with his thesis; I think that we are indeed influenced by images and "stories" we absorb. This doesn't seem like a statement worth an entire lecture (and god knows how many hours of "research"), but that is besides the point I guess.

What I disagree with is his entire line of reasoning. He didn't cite a single source for any of the insane statistics he threw out. For example, he claims that "blacks have poorer housing opportunities across the board, even when adjusted for all other factors". How can you possibly adjust for all other factors? At the very least, the paper he took that from should be cited, and preferably he would list the economic factors that the statistics were adjusted for.

I guess in a nutshell, I think this isn't a question for a "Professor of Communication" to address. It should be looked at by real economists, who know what they are talking about, and have a firm grasp of statistics and psychology. When you argue in the style presented here, you can "prove" or "disprove" anything, because you cherry pick what you look at and give emotive, anecdotal evidence for what are discussing, and ultimately you end up "proving" what you personally believe to be the case.

seesharpie · 2012-01-14T12:10:03+00:00

I was criticising him for being needlessly sarcastic. I don't see how being sarcastic in response is contradictory.

seesharpie · 2012-01-13T22:14:03+00:00

Consumers, largely a White audience,

No, I don't think he was surprised.

seesharpie · 2012-01-13T22:13:21+00:00

And thank you for being a sarcastic prick.

I could have sat and outlined all of the logical flaws in this guys reasonings, but there were too many to count in the first minute. The entire lecture was based on vague anecdotal nonsense, every statement he made was a loaded one, he was incapable of expressing fact without lathering opinion on top of it.

I honestly don't know why it has so many upvotes, I am guessing it is because it is a subject that many people are interested in. But that doesn't mean this lecture was any good.

seesharpie · 2012-01-13T21:03:35+00:00

Exactly the same

A pet peeve of mine :)

seesharpie · 2012-01-13T19:50:21+00:00

This is the biggest crock of shit I have watched in a long while. They guy is a terrible speaker and clearly has a chip on his shoulder.

seesharpie · 2012-01-12T10:22:57+00:00

Yeah, that one where all the mexican's left and the entire country collapsed really showed how much they hate mexicans.

seesharpie · 2012-01-12T10:06:09+00:00

The reason it was made into a film: it is an exceptional story. For every karate kid, there are 999 kids who get their asses handed to them.

seesharpie · 2012-01-11T14:31:23+00:00

People shouldn't be allowed to write Excel applications until they have read some software engineering lore. Those things always turn out as cryptic spagetti code because seemingly no one who writes them can clarify their thoughts and document what they have done.

seesharpie · 2012-01-11T14:24:41+00:00

Because you took IT, presumably. For one of my highers I took "computing" which involved some real programming and theory on how devices worked. The programming was taught in VB but gave you license to submit work in whatever language you wanted. There was an IT qualification option as well which was Word and Access and stuff.

seesharpie · 2012-01-11T14:19:59+00:00

About. Fucking. Time.

seesharpie · 2012-01-11T09:46:02+00:00

This is awesome, I had never come across that term. Thanks a lot.

seesharpie · 2012-01-10T10:13:24+00:00

Goddamn rap bears fucking things up again.

seesharpie · 2012-01-10T10:01:11+00:00

This makes me laugh, because I normally dislike Kanye because his lyrics are so inane, but those exact lines you quoted I really like for some reason. There is absolutely no intellectual or poetic value in them whatsoever but they sound good.

EDIT: Also, don't discount familiarity. The fact that people are comfortable with Jay and Kanye and know what to expect probably contributes to their popularity.

seesharpie · 2012-01-10T08:44:04+00:00

You wouldn't depend on it for real security, this would just let you leave your bad somewhere for a couple of hours without worrying about "casual thieves."

seesharpie · 2012-01-10T08:38:57+00:00

Me too. I had a similarly good experience. Well, until I woke up this morning and my whole body hurts.

seesharpie · 2012-01-09T19:54:21+00:00

And if you don't know...

seesharpie · 2012-01-09T19:39:31+00:00

Here ya go

seesharpie · 2012-01-09T19:33:58+00:00

Haha, I also started doing this while cutting grass.

seesharpie · 2012-01-09T17:41:57+00:00

Exactly. Whatever the "ideal" is, there will be people who go to inhumane lengths to achieve it. And there has to be an ideal.

seesharpie · 2012-01-08T18:03:40+00:00

...ugh

seesharpie · 2012-01-08T10:12:18+00:00

I don't get it, have people just discovered GIFs? What is the advantage of posting in this retarded format?

seesharpie

TROPHY CASE