Celebrities (other than Chris Brown) who have committed violence against women

Stereotypes happen. I try not to embrace them or avoid them. My job is to focus on bringing characters to life in an honest and personal way.

That being said, I did play three Sanjays in 2007. Yep. Three different Sanjays: one in a TV pilot, one in an independent film, and one in a cable show.*

Two ‘Sanjays’ might be a coincidence. Three ‘Sanjays’ is a flat-out trend. So what caused the ‘2007 Sanjay fever’? Was it the success of American Idol sensation ‘Sanjaya’? Possibly. Well? Yes. But what concerns me more is something deeper, something sinister revealed within this data. Maybe when people look at me all they see is a ‘Sanjay’. Like a 45-year-old woman with blonde hair, a fake tan, and long fingernails who works at a salon is probably a Debbie, am I a ‘Sanjay’?

Here are some of the words used in the casting descriptions for ‘Sanjay’: “quirky”, “mild-mannered”, “placid facade”, “virginal” and “allergic to dogs”. Dangit. These words fit me. But in Sanskrit, the word ‘Sanjay’ actually means “Victorious”, or “Conqueror”. Hmmm, “Victorious Conqueror” doesn’t exactly fit me, but my wife hopes that someday it will.

Regardless of the reasons for ‘Sanjay Fever’, I have learned that a name can only reveal so much. Though people might find comfort in naming me Raj, Arash or Sanjay, I know that I can be more than a ‘Quirky Virgin’; I can also be a ‘Victorious Conqueror’ (someday). After all, my real name is Daniel, and I am named after a Polish rock star.

*I auditioned for a 4th Sanjay in 2007 but ultimately lost the role to a friend.

[R]ace, gender, and sexual stereotypes intertwine in different ways. Thus, African American men are stereotyped as hypermasculine and oversexed, and African American women as promiscuous, bad mothers, and nurturing ‘mammies’ who care for everyone else, but not their own children.. Latinos are stereotyped as ‘macho’, and like African American men, sexually passionate, but out of control. Latinas are stereotyped as either ‘hot’ or virgin-like. Similarly, white women are sexually stereotyped in dichotomous terms as ‘madonnas’ or ‘whores’. Working-class women are more likely to be seen as ‘sluts’ and upper-class women as frigid and cold.

Imagine a film such as Inception with an entire cast of black people – do you think it would be successful? Would people watch it? But no one questions the fact that everyone’s white. That’s what we have to change.

A vision of cultural homogeneity that seeks to deflect attention away from or even excuse the oppressive, dehumanizing impact of white supremacy on the lives of black people by suggesting black people are racist too indicates that the culture remains ignorant of what racism really is and how it works. It shows that people are in denial.

Why is it so difficult for many white folks to understand that racism is oppressive not because white folks have prejudicial feelings about blacks (they could have such feelings and leave us alone) but because it is a system that promotes domination and subjugation? The prejudicial feelings some blacks may express about whites are in no way linked to a system of domination that affords us any power to coercively control the lives and well-being of white folks. That needs to be understood.

Concurrently, all social manifestations of black separatism are often seen by whites as a sign of anti-white racism, when they usually represent an attempt by black people to construct places of political sanctuary where we can escape, if only for a time, white domination.

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thenewgq:

thepeoplesrecord:

Emmett Till: the case that spurred the Civil Rights movement
July 25, 2012 

Today marks what would have been the 71^st birthday of Emmett Louis Till, the 14-year-old black Chicago youth who became the catalyst that sparked the American Civil Rights Movement.

In August 1955, Till went to visit his southern relatives in the Mississippi Delta. In less than a week’s time, he would be abducted from his great-uncle’s home, tortured and then murdered for one of the oldest taboos of the South: whistling at a white woman in public. 

Two men, J.W. Milam and his half-brother Roy Bryant (the woman’s husband), were soon arrested but later acquitted in a court of law by an all-white, all-male jury, awakening the “Sleeping Giant” of the black global community.

His mother, Mamie, insisted on an open casket funeral so that thousands could see the horrifying effects of racism & violence in the South. Till’s murder became known as the epitome of white supremacy that rallied the Civil Rights Movement to fight for justice & equality. 

Click here to watch Emmett Till’s cousin, Airickca Gordon-Taylor, speak about Till’s legacy & the fight against racism.

This face still gives me chills. The resemblance to my little favorite cousin is scary…

(via everythingbutharleyquinn)

Disliking hip-hop doesn’t make you a racist any more than liking hip-hop makes you not a racist, and I’m sure there are plenty of Stormfront enthusiasts with Rick Ross in their iTunes. If you don’t like Jay-Z because you just don’t like the way he sounds, or you’re sick of his cloying ubiquity, or you wish he’d talk about something other than where he’s from for five seconds — hey, I’m not mad, I don’t like Bruce Springsteen for the same reasons. But if you don’t like rap music — a genre that contains multitudes — because of a self-satisfied moralism, or because you’re scared of it, or because you wish those people would stop talking about their problems and get out of your television and radio and kids’ bedrooms: well.
And I’m not just talking about the American right, I’m talking about all the well-meaning white folks who’ve told me how they want to like Lil Wayne but lo, the misogyny, the violence, the drugs. But, but, I’ll say: Bob Dylan aced misogyny; the Rolling Stones sang about violence; the Velvet Underground knew their way around some drugs. Yeeeah, but it’s different, they’ll say, elongating that “yeah” with conspiratorial inflection: you know what I mean. Yeah, I know exactly what you mean.
Rap music doesn’t get unarmed kids shot to death, “it’s different” does. “It’s different” infuses “these assholes always get away” and gives solace to people who hear that sound bite and nod their empty heads in agreement. “It’s different” is the same logic that suggests a teenager’s skin color combined with the music he listened to means he had it coming, and it’s the same logic that lets a bunch of people feign outrage over a teenager’s use of the n-word to describe himself when they’re really just outraged that he beat them to the punch.
“It’s different” makes me shake with anger because it turns music into a dog-whistle to justify the murder of a kid who doesn’t seem all that “different” from me was when I was his age, not that different at all. I liked Skittles and hoodies and weed, too. And yeah, I’m white and never worried about getting shot for any of it, which is only the most loathsome excuse for not identifying with someone that I can possibly think of.

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lipstick-feminists:

[image description: photo of a female-presenting Asian person with a tee-shirt that reads “I WILL NOT LOVE YOU LONG TIME”]
[TW: racial and sexual slurs and stereotyping]

sequin-stuffed:

drvy:

“Me love you long time” came into prominence with Stanley Kubrick’s “Full Metal Jacket,” (from 1987) as a Vietnamese prostitute tries to pick up Matthew Modine’s character with broken English. The phrase was then popularly picked up by 2 Live Crew in the song “Me So Horny.”

“It’s so many different kinds of slurs in one,” comedian Margaret Cho said. “It’s instantly putting you in the position of being a foreigner, an outsider and a sexual stereotype. It’s an all-in-one combo.”

~naturallaw for yahoo questions

The popularization by Mariah Carey’s ‘Love You Long Time,’ Fergie’s ‘London Bridge,’ and Nicki Minaj’s ““Muahhhh me love you long time like I’m asian” demonstrates how this exotification of Asian/A.American women is constantly recycled in the media, perpetuated by celebrities to obtain the hyper-sexualized image needed to make it big, especially if you ain’t got the talent.

I would get started on Nicki’s whole hyper-sexualized, Japanese dolled up shit, but racialious says it best. Well researched: here http://www.racialicious.com/2010/11/01/the-orientalism-of-nicki-minaj/

You can degrade yourself, but no, my sisters and I will NOT love you long time.

Yes for the commentary.

(via lipstick-feminists)