"Steve is equipped with Electronic Fool Injection" (itsalwayssteve)
03/10/2018 at 11:30 • Filed to: Culture
0
7|
"Steve is equipped with Electronic Fool Injection" (itsalwayssteve)
03/10/2018 at 11:30 • Filed to: Culture | 0
| 7 |
Safety image: the best wheels to put on a CB or CD accord
I’m a dumb white guy but I’m going to be student teaching 4th grade in a 75% African-American school this fall. As I do my teaching methods and tutoring, I’m getting know as many students, teachers, and staff as I can. It’s hard to work all day in the school and not fall for these kids. They’re smart and engaged in school, and all the problems I’ve seen have come from the fact that they’re kids.
It’s also a title I school, and about 70% of the kids have free or reduced lunches and breakfast at school. I’ve been there myself.
I approach them where they are, and when things get personal, I try to relate to them on a level we both understand. For many of them, it’s the experience of being part of the suburban working class/ lower-middle class. Mom works retail or customer service; dad is a truck driver or does shift work in the industrial sector; we have to go to grandma’s house after school because both parents work late.
Our cultures differ in other ways, and especially in entertainment. Specifically, comedy: What makes us laugh is closely tied to our experience. It’s interwoven with culture, locale, and age.
Yesterday, one of the kids was talking about her grandma and how much she loved Madea movies. My racist in-laws also love Madea movies, but probably for vastly different reasons.
In my observation, every Black person I know who likes the Madea movies has said something about how the over-the-top characters are caricatures of people they know. I’ve only ever seen one Madea movie, but I can see the reasoning.
For my racist in laws, Madea is like a minstrel show. It seems their prejudices change what is obviously a caricature of the strong-willed “crazy aunt,” in every family into “crazy *N* with her crazy *N* ways.”
Of course I could be totally wrong and off base, but I observed that and thought I would share.
Spanfeller is a twat
> Steve is equipped with Electronic Fool Injection
03/10/2018 at 12:00 |
|
Sensitivity, understanding, and empathy go a long way in every situation... Specially at a school..
|
Steve is equipped with Electronic Fool Injection
> Spanfeller is a twat
03/10/2018 at 12:19 |
|
True. Empathy and sensitivity take effort. Looking beyond your own experiences to try to understand other people takes effort. It takes effort to question the idea that everyone has the same opportunity as yourself.
|
Spanfeller is a twat
> Steve is equipped with Electronic Fool Injection
03/10/2018 at 12:26 |
|
It takes effort to question the idea that everyone has the same opportunity as yourself.
Yup.
HFV has no HFV. But somehow has 2 motorcycles
> Steve is equipped with Electronic Fool Injection
03/10/2018 at 15:38 |
|
On the flip side you have white people who get all upset because those movies are “offensive” and “support racial stereotypes” some how forgetting that is was created by a black person.
Ash78, voting early and often
> Steve is equipped with Electronic Fool Injection
03/10/2018 at 15:47 |
|
If you want deep dichotomies of black characters, see if you can find some of the older ones like Stepn Fetchit. From what little I’ve read about his background, his character is superficially just a lower-class subservient black man doing the bidding of everyone else. But a lot of tv and film scholars say it’s much more than that — that he “tricked” his (often white) superiors into doing things themselves in a very old form of a confidence game that dates back to the slave era. Getting out of work by feigning incompetence, basically. But depending on the audience, they’ll see what they want to see.
Tyler Perry is a smart and cultured guy, but I don’t really see it come through with Madea. She’s more like the black female version of Ernest P. Worrell IMO. Slapstick and sight gags.
|
Steve is equipped with Electronic Fool Injection
> HFV has no HFV. But somehow has 2 motorcycles
03/10/2018 at 16:32 |
|
That in and of itself is a kind of racial prejudice. “Those poor black folk don’t know how they’re being exploited for money,” etc. just perpetuates the idea of the white savior.
Phyrxes once again has a wagon!
> Steve is equipped with Electronic Fool Injection
03/12/2018 at 21:05 |
|
General sports knowledge can also go a long way towards making conversations. I am personally indifferent to all things basketball but paid enough attention to exist at the periphery of conversations among students. Even if its just watching sports center highlights its enough to ask about some play it makes an effective conversation starter.