Little Britain removed from streaming services

[rue the polywhirl]

I'm pretty glad I got my Always Sunny and Community rewatches out of the way immediately before all this went down. I would have been feeling pretty aggrieved if my marathons of either of those series were rendered incomplete. I'm currently rewatching Arrested Development from the start and I wonder if racist puppets will be soon be quickly next for the censor chop. By the time I get to the Franklin episodes they probably won't exist anymore. That episode of Community that Chevy Chase ends up getting sacked from (because of racist puppets that made him go racist in protest) will also go as well.

[PlanktonSideburns]

Alison Brie regrets Dianne Nygen in Bojack.
https://www.cbr.com/bojack-horseman-alison-brie-regrets-voicing-asian-american-character/?utm_content=buffer9f8c6&utm_medium=Social-Distribution&utm_source=CBR-TW&utm_campaign=CBR-TW

I don't disagree with the idea that perhaps the gig should've gone to an actual Asian voice actor, but it seems a bit like she's having her cake and eating it deciding this after the show's recently ended and she's cashed the cheques for 6 years.

Must remember to do a load of racially dodgy stuff I can regret later on to show how much I've grown as a person

[Mister Six]

A lot of this stuff will be quietly restored in a couple of years, until the next US police atrocity.

[Noodle Lizard]

In the US, Britbox seems to have kept everything up, albeit with new content advisories at the start of some episodes (just noticed it appearing on the first Papa Lazarou episode of LoG). It's silly they didn't bother doing that for any of the actual racist/homophobic/transphobic jokes in almost every other episode, just the one where the demon looks a bit like a minstrel.

Still, at least it's still up. If they feel like they have to throw one of those warnings up there for whatever reason, I'm not bothered.

[Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth]

Has Tropic Thunder come under the microscope yet? It can only be a matter of time if not.

I tend to draw a line between, for want of better descriptions, "real" and "ironic" blackface. As I understand it, the problems of the real kind (e.g. Little Britain and Birth of a Nation) are that it denies roles to minority actors and projects the filmmaker's attitudes onto the race being depicted. I feel like neither of these issues apply to the ironic kind (e.g. Tropic Thunder and 30 Rock) and therefore they ought to be safe from cancellation. I suppose they are arguably having their cake and eating it and maybe that has the effect of making the real kind more accepted, but they are explicitly critical of the practice.

It's certainly not something that should be done carelessly. Perhaps it should be considered on a similar level to dead baby jokes and the like, but not necessarily outlawed.

Tropic Thunder could have added another layer and have Kirk Lazarus played by a black actor in whiteface.

But then, I've got basically every form of privilege going, so I'm not sure my opinion on the matter is all that relevant.

[Shit Good Nose]

Tropic Thunder has been bubbling away ever since it came out.  I did see a couple of things mentioned a few weeks ago, but I think it has managed to escape any full-blown controversy due to its mega meta treatment of that scenario, which even carried on to the film's DVD/blu-ray extras and commentary (which Downey Jnr does in character).  All that being the case, it's not one that's easy to pick apart and analyse under standard BLM rules.

[gilbertharding]

Wasn't there a film where Sir Leonard Henry 'whited up'? I never saw it, but I gathered the plot was the inverse of the film Soul Man (which I did see, for some reason). Then there's the end bit of Trading Places where Dan Ackroyd pretends to be Jamaican for no readily apparent reason.

[Brundle-Fly]

True Identity
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7JBXtVrGmaI

[SavageHedgehog]

I seem to remember there was more presumptive controversy over use of the R-word in reference to Stiller's character's I Am Sam-esque Oscar bait film than there was for Downey Jr in blackface. Stiller also ruffled a few feathers more recently with Benedict Cumberbatch's gender free model in Zoolander 2, a film that has effectively cancelled itself anyway.

[kalowski]

Then there's the end bit of Trading Places where Dan Ackroyd pretends to be Jamaican for no readily apparent reason.

That bit is so ridiculous it's brilliant. I would also add this scene from Silver Streak.
Surely these two scenes are saved from cancellation by involving Eddie Murphy and Richard Pryor?

[Shit Good Nose]

That bit is so ridiculous it's brilliant. I would also add this scene from Silver Streak.
Surely these two scenes are saved from cancellation by involving Eddie Murphy and Richard Pryor?

The issue now (and I have seen this mentioned with regard to Trading Places) would be that those scenarios were both written and directed by privileged white men.

[dothestrand]

Wasn't there a film where Sir Leonard Henry 'whited up'? I never saw it, but I gathered the plot was the inverse of the film Soul Man (which I did see, for some reason). Then there's the end bit of Trading Places where Dan Ackroyd pretends to be Jamaican for no readily apparent reason.

White Chicks was trending for a while recently as a weird counter-argument to blackface. I'm amazed people who see this as comparable with blackface can even eat, sleep and breathe tbh.

Aykroyd's blackface is uncomfortable - if I was offering a very lame defence, I might suggest the whole point was that all their disguises to fool Beeks were all shit e.g. JLC saying she's Swedish yet she's clearly dressed as a Swiss girl.

[kalowski]

The issue now (and I have seen this mentioned with regard to Trading Places) would be that those scenarios were both written and directed by privileged white men.

I know. It's just that both portrayals are ridiculous to the point of extremity. It's not for me, as another privileged white man, to say who should be offended by it, I just hope people aren't, and see them as ludicrous representations that show the stupidity of the white guys.

[thenoise]

I vaguely remember the poster for white chicks, but it's hardly held up as an example of classic comedy, is it? Even its fans probably agree its shit. I haven't watched it, just making a sweeping generalisation based on how shit it was.

And I'm pretty sure there were plenty of butt hurt 'if they were white it's be banned' type reviews at the time - certainly more than ever called out Little Britain or Bo Selecta for their blackface.

[Sebastian Cobb]

I was chatting to a rather individualistic American earlier (who still thinks they should wear masks) but drew a comparison to seatbelts and motorbike helmets, which aren't required in the us, and made me remember you're exempt in the UK if you're a Sikh. Which made me remember the OFAH episode about the helmets, that was a bit wank in retrospect wasn't it?

Another thing I was thinking about randomly was Auf Wiedersehn Pet, for the most part it's fine, Oz is an obvious bigot but it's obvious he's a bigot and Dennis is the voice of reason - quite progressive for the time if anything, but one scene that gets me is when Neville is moonlighting as a guy in an Indian restaurant and they all do a load of crass racist abuse more fitting to a 70's comedy. It's extra shit because it cheapens the fact Oz moaned about a German being rude to an Indian guy in the restaurant and Dennis points out the double-standard that he's sat in restaurants where Oz has been a prick and called waiters 'Saubu' or 'Gunga Din'.